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How To Destroy Hillary Clinton 2016, Part I

Sex-pot Gennifer Flowers, “bimbo eruptions,” pot smoking, draft-dodging, “cocaine airports,” a ‘two bit governor from a two bit state,” failed investments, corruption, sleazy associates, soviet stooge, black bastard baby father, communist state agent, student revolutionary. These were some of the sure to destroy him allegations at Bill Clinton in 1992. Bill Clinton won. Later, panty sniffer Kenny Starr added murder suicide Vinny, trailer park Paula, perjury, rape, DNA stained dresses, travel office firings, and more to the list of sure fire weapons of victory. Bill Clinton became more popular than ever and left the White House with 65% approval. Then we got more about a power hungry evil wife, stolen furniture, corrupt pardons, typewriters with a missing “w”, loans from friends, big houses, and huge speaking fees. The result was a popular Bill Clinton and a popular Senator Hillary Clinton. Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.

Rational opposition party partisan thinkers would by now begin to realize that perhaps the tactics need to change if they finally want to achieve the aim of bringing down Bill and/or Hillary Clinton. Boob Barack Obama figured out how to get the job done (by shouts of “racist” from his minions and back room deals with Ted Kennedy, Kerry, DailyKooks and others) because he is a genius at self-advancement devoid of decency. But even Barack Obama was forced to bow to Bill Clinton for reelection salvation. Now Barack finds himself in the lose/lose position of trying to stop Hillary from replacing him in more ways than one while at the same time realizing that it will be worse for his “legacy” if he destroys his party completely and Republicans take the White House, Senate, House, governorships and state legislatures in 2014 and 2016.

It’s now 2014, Republicans are poised to begin their further takeover of political offices from coast to coast, but they still don’t have a clue about how to stop Hillary Clinton 2016. Time magazine next week will on its cover ask the question “Can anyone stop Hillary?” The answer is “yes”. But can the same old same old get the job done? The answer is “no”. Consider the latest sure fire can’t miss partisan weapons deployed to once and for all stop Hillary Clinton 2016.

The tightly wound Gretchen Carlson and Sean Hannity this week both highlighted what will surely destroy Hillary Clinton 2016. Their weapon of sass destruction? The Bob Gates book anecdote of Hillary and Barack Obama confessing to each other that their opposition to the Iraq war surge was political theater and positioning necessary because of the 2008 Iowa caucuses. Treason! Horror! This is a fascinating anecdote from the very credible Bob Gates – but not for the reasons that Hillary opponents want.

Why is this a fascinating anecdote worthy of lots of attention and examination? Well, first of all Bob Gates and Hillary Clinton were allies (“I found her smart, idealistic but pragmatic, tough-minded, indefatigable, funny, a very valuable colleague, and a superb representative of the United States all over the world.”) in the Obama White House of Horror. Second, who is damaged by this story? Carlson and Hannity think it is Hillary 2016 that is most hurt. Their reasoning is that Hillary Clinton in 2016 will be the one with a future to stop while Barack Obama is a lame duck with no future elections to compete in.

Carlson and Hannity think they can tar and destroy Hillary with the shocking allegation of “being political”. But isn’t Hillary Clinton already viewed as “political”? That shocking allegation has about as much resonance as Bill Clinton smoking pot in college. Whose credibility gets hurt by that anecdote? It is Barack Obama that has tried to posture himself as the non-political non-politicians ruling as a philosopher-king. If we were conspiracy minded we would say that Hillary getting Barack Obama to confess that his opposition to the Iraq surge was for base political motives was a Hillary Clinton/Bob Gates trap that Obama fell into.

Carlson and Hannity want this anecdote to be a Clinton killer but there is a problem. The problem with this “political” treason story of evil Hillary Clinton making life and death military decisions for corrupt political reasons related to 2008 elections in Iowa and confessing this in front of her ally Bob Gates is a certain video unearthed by the ever vigilant, ever faithful, ever ready Still4Hill:

That anti-surge statement by Senator Hillary Clinton was made in January 2007 well before the Iowa caucuses of 2008 and well before the Kennedy/Kerry treacheries made coffee carrier Barack Obama into a candidate with a chance that Hillary had to be wary of. So who is hurt by the Gates anecdote?

“Midway through Barack Obama’s first term as president, U.S. officials grew alarmed that Israel might launch a unilateral air strike against Iran’s nuclear program. Iran had snubbed Obama’s outreach after the 2008 election, and rejected an October 2009 international proposal to ship most of its enriched uranium out of the country—stirring pessimism about prospects for a future breakthrough.

“Militarily, I thought we needed to prepare for a possible Israeli attack and Iranian retaliation,” former Defense Secretary Robert Gates writes in his new memoir, Duty. At a January 2010 Oval Office meeting, Gates told Obama “he needed to consider the ramifications of a no-warning Israeli attack,” including whether the U.S. would assist Israel and how it would respond to Iranian retaliation.

Around the same time, senior officials met to discuss ways the U.S. might dissuade Israeli Prime Minister from taking unilateral action. In one such meeting, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton raised a bracing question, two former Obama administration officials tell TIME: Was it possible that, instead of trying to restrain Israel, the U.S. should instead provide what one of those official described as “a tacit green light to the Israelis to take care of the problem for us”? In other words, instead of begging Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to give diplomacy more time, perhaps it was worth telling him to go proceed with airstrikes.“

Veto-proof majorities in the Senate are about to challenge the Barack Obama/John Kerry appeasement of Iran on the same week Barack Obama bores the nation with a “State of the Union” snoozefest. Don’t expect Hillary Clinton’s realistic approach to Iran and strong support of Israel to cause her any political trouble with anyone but the wackadoodle DailyKooks and the totalitarian left.

The Bob Gates book is not going to hurt Hillary Clinton 2016 but instead will be a help. Then there’s Benghazi. If anything coulda shoulda woulda hurt Hillary Clinton 2016 it might have been Benghazi. But at this point, what difference will it make? Republicans investigating Benghazi have been so hapless on this that it won’t make much difference at all.

The Senate geniuses concluded that the Benghazi attack was “likely preventable“. In a shocking cherry on top the Senate MENSA squad declared that Benghazi… well Benghazi was something or other but they are not quite sure and that the CIA was something or other and in either case this and that or that and this blah blah blah yada yada yada.

We used to take Benghazi seriously. We called for a select committee to investigate what happened and who was responsible for what. We called for special prosecutors to get at the truth. We thought it was obvious that an attack on an American facility on September 11 was a terrorist attack. What we got was no select committee, no credible investigation, no prosecutors, and only years after a Senate report that appears to somehow imply that yeah, kinda sorta it is fer shur kinda like weird or something that a bunch of Americans were killed on like this totally weirdo coincidental date of like, um, September 11, ya know.

Taken together with previous investigations, the report leaves no doubt that four Americans died as a result of negligence and bad judgment at the highest levels of the State Department as well as a determination to avoid doing anything that might alter the public perception that the Obama administration had vanquished al-Qaeda. It’s a sorry record and one for which no one, especially those at the top of the food chain, have been held accountable. But conservatives who have been frustrated by the way Clinton has evaded criticism over Benghazi shouldn’t get their hopes up about this report. No one should labor under the delusion that it will hinder Clinton’s efforts to secure the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016. [snip]

While Republicans are right to complain about this and should pursue further inquiries, they need to lower their expectations about this controversy.”

The advice from the Republican/conservative is that Benghazi is no “silver bullet” but that Hillary Clinton 2016 will be hurt at some point in the future, somehow. Keep dreaming. We expect that by 2020 there will be a select committee and special prosecutor appointed that by 2030 will find that Benghazi is in Libya.

“Years later, they would joke among themselves in harsh terms about the fates of folks they felt had betrayed them. “Bill Richardson: investigated; John Edwards: disgraced by scandal; Chris Dodd: stepped down,” one said to another. “Ted Kennedy,” the aide continued, lowering his voice to a whisper for the punch line, “dead.”

The Hopium-laced blood will flow in rivers down the corridors of the DNC if and when Hillary Clinton gets the nomination in 2016. Donna Brazille, the DailyKooks, Judas Richardson, certain Kennedys, and everyone else who sided with Barack Obama over Hillary in 2008 will be disemboweled.

Before the 2008 election cycle began Hillary Clinton was completely unaware of what treachery was being concocted by the person we had defended for so long, Ted Kennedy. We then began to call him the “Chappaquiddick Chauffeur”:

“Add Pelosi, McCaskill, Dean, Kerry, and the Democratic organizations to the anti-Hillary mob. Bamboozlement! A clan of corrupt and coopted establishment figures knew Obama could beMARKETED as a candidate of “transformation”. Bamboozlement! Inexperience became an asset. Not voting became a defense.A stooge was marketed as a leader.

The real Game Changer of course was Hillary Clinton who could unite African-Americans and the White Working Class Men and Women and Latinos and Women Independents and Republicans and truly transform the Democratic Party into a majority party for a long time. Hillary Clinton who won in Southern States with the enthusiastic support of men and who, according to exit polls, would have gotten more Republican votes in the general election and a bigger margin against John McCain than Obama was blocked BY THE DEMOCRATIC ESTABLISHMENT for their own power purposes.

Ted Kennedy, the Chappaquiddick Chauffeur, who had backed Obama for years and was a secret power (mocking Bill Clinton in secret with “hick” imitations and laughed because few knew that he, Ted Kennedy was no “neutral” but instead the power behind the stooge), gifted Obama the nomination and as part of the strategy smeared Bill Clinton as a racist. The establishment did their sleazy job well and the “creative class” dupes and dimwitted stooges went right along. How dumb is that?

These creeps, at least the ones still alive and viable politically, pretend that they are “ready for Hillary” and now endorse Hillary Clinton 2016. They are liars.

These treacherous pigs that must be politically slaughtered are fooling no one in HillaryLand.

What drives these treacherous pigs, what these treacherous pigs fear is that they will pay the price Carlo paid.

What these treacherous pigs that must be slaughtered plot is “How to destroy Hillary Clinton 2016″.

I have not read your post above yet Admin, but I gotta hope you have some real humor intended to go along with the title above, because at first glance, it makes me pretty upset after a crappy day at work.

Was it possible that, instead of trying to restrain Israel, the U.S. should instead provide what one of those official described as “a tacit green light to the Israelis to take care of the problem for us”? In other words, instead of begging Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to give diplomacy more time, perhaps it was worth telling him to go proceed with airstrikes.“
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When I heard that earlier in the day, I thought, that is the strategy I would have promoted. Clearly, she was the only adult in the room.

We thought it was obvious that an attack on an American facility on September 11 was a terrorist attack. What we got was no select committee, no credible investigation, no prosecutors, and only years after a Senate report that appears to somehow imply that yeah, kinda sorta it is fer shur kinda like weird or something that a bunch of Americans were killed on like this totally weirdo coincidental date of like, um, September 11, ya know.

Cybersecurity researchers slammed HealthCare.gov’s security during a House hearing on Thursday, saying the site is still riddled with problems that could put consumers’ sensitive health details at risk.

“The reason we’re concluding that this is so shockingly bad is that the issues across the site are so varied,” David Kennedy, founder of the information security firm TrustedSec, told NBC News. “You don’t even have to hack into the system to see big issues – which means there are [major problems] underneath.”

Kennedy was the first of a group of so-called “white-hat hackers” who testified before the House of Representatives Science Committee on Thursday. He previously testified on November 19, when he said he was able to identify 18 major issues with the site – without even hacking into it.

Well, the talk about Oprah being a shoe-in was prior to the releases of 12 Years a Slave and American Hustle. This was simply a case of betting the horse before finding out what else was in the carriage.

Allow me to save you all the chore of the Oscars and give you what will be Hollywood’s PC vote:

Best Picture: 12 Years a Slave

Best Actor: Leonardo DiCaprio just to thumb their noses at American film viewers who are disgusted over the “F” bomb being dropped over 400 times in this film.

Best Actress: Cate Blanchett (on a personal note, Emma Thompson should have had a nod instead of Meryl Streep in this category.)

Best Supporting Actress: Sorry, JLAW, you won an Oscar last year and the PC squad will give it to 12 Years a Slave’s nominee.

Best Supporting Actor: Jared Leto

Best Director: I can’t spell his name but the director of Gravity.

Best Screenplay: I have a hunch it will go to the writer of “Her”..because it is just out there enough to swing the vote.

Best song: U2

My pick for possible upset of the evening: Matthew McConaghey for Best Actor.

In one such meeting, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton raised a bracing question, two former Obama administration officials tell TIME: Was it possible that, instead of trying to restrain Israel, the U.S. should instead provide what one of those official described as “a tacit green light to the Israelis to take care of the problem for us”? In other words, instead of begging Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to give diplomacy more time, perhaps it was worth telling him to go proceed with airstrikes.“

This was exactly the same tactic a young Emperor Palpatine backed as Sec Def the FIRST time we gave tacit approval to the Israelis. The Israelis have always proven to be the best military fighting force in the region. When we can effect foreign MILITARY policy outside the arms of the UN, it demonstrates what true power looks like, NOT DRAWING A RED LINE SOMEWHERE IN SOME SAND. And here is the best thing about it – American lives are not put at risk.

I doubt that even if this WH DID give that approval to Israelis, they would botch the execution of it.

We used to take Benghazi seriously. We called for a select committee to investigate what happened and who was responsible for what. We called for special prosecutors to get at the truth. We thought it was obvious that an attack on an American facility on September 11 was a terrorist attack. What we got was no select committee, no credible investigation, no prosecutors, and only years after a Senate report that appears to somehow imply that yeah, kinda sorta it is fer shur kinda like weird or something that a bunch of Americans were killed on like this totally weirdo coincidental date of like, um, September 11, ya know.
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Latches, i.e. equity aids the vigilant—no him who sleeps on his rights.

There were just as many warnings before the original 911 as there was for Benghazi. I don’t recall democrats or the media demanding George Bush be investigated.

For the media to now imply that the U.S. government should have immediately credited those who engineered the Benghazi attack is additional silliness.

Why empower the people responsible by crediting them?

The U.S. has 294 embassies and consulates all over the world, on any given day there is probably a rumor about a few of them, rushing additional firepower every time a rumor is unearthed would be the low cost way for terrorism to succeed by forcing the U.S. to over commit resources on a perpetual basis.

The CIA was keeping tabs on the situation in Benghazi not so sure that it is Hillary Clinton’s job to boss around the CIA on matters such as Benghazi, and certainly not on a daily basis.

Meanwhile 22 more veterans committed suicide in the U.S. today while conservatives continue to attempt to make the discussion about Benghazi. That Benghazi tactic by the conservatives is not much different than terrorists creating ongoing rumors that the U.S. government must sometimes ignore or risk going bankrupt by responding to every manufactured rumor.

In the video below, we have the spectacle of a CMS official telling us they literally do not know who has paid for their Obamacare premiums. The administration literally does not collect the information, though we are assured they will do so at some point. They will have to go back and “reconcile” that information later.

How on earth could something this appallingly bad ever have become law in a modern industrialized nation? This is the sort of thing that you expect from banana republics and dysfunctional socialist regimes . . . oh, wait, now I get it.

We thought that all perfectly idiotic headlines regarding the encroachment of central-planning would come from traditional banana republics as Venezuela, and of course France, such as the following:

MADURO SAYS VENEZUELA TO HAVE NEW FX SYSTEM
MADURO SAYS DOLLAR TO REMAIN AT 6.3 BS/DOLLAR IN 2014
MADURO CREATES AGENCY TO ENFORCE FAIR PRICES
MADURO SAYS LAW TO ALLOW MAX. 30% PROFIT MARGIN
NIGERIA TO SET UP FANNIE MAE-STYLE MORTGAGE FINANCE CO.
FRANCE PASSES LAW TO TAX WEALTHY AT 75%

And so on.

Boy were we wrong.

Moments ago The Hill reported that what many thought was absolutely impossible, may in fact become a reality: President Obama is considering issuing an executive order (#394,039,993,837?) to raise the minimum wage for Federal Workers… and in the process – with the help of that other central planner par excellence Bernyellen – lap all those other Banana republics that everyone so enjoys making fun of.

From the Hill:

President Obama is considering using his executive authority to raise the minimum wage for federal contractors, he told Senate Democrats during a closed meeting at the White House.

Lawmakers present at the Wednesday night session said Thursday that Obama did not bring up the matter himself, but appeared receptive to the idea when questioned on the topic. “The issue was raised,” Sen. Barbra Boxer (D-Calif.) said Thursday. “He said he was looking at it, as he looks at everything else.”

NBC Silent on $7.3 Million from Soros for Special Anchor’s Liberal Report

The Center for American Progress partnered with Maria Shriver on lib, NBC promoted report.

Not only did NBC allow their special anchor Maria Shriver to promote her own report on “Nightly News,” they did it without disclosing that it was made in partnership with a group that liberal billionaire George Soros gave $7.3 million to.

In “The Shriver Report: A Woman’s Nation Pushes Back From the Brink,” which was published on Jan. 11, an outspokenly liberal nun, Sister Joan Chittister, took aim at religious attitudes in America that “devalue” and marginalize women.

Shriver was invited to the White House on Jan. 14 to present her report to President Barack Obama, whom she promoted as being “sympathetic” to working mothers. On NBC “Nightly News” that same night, Shriver contrasted a supportive Obama against a Congress that is supposedly dragging its feet on the matter. “While President Obama has pledged to fix the problem, Congress has been slow to respond,” Shriver said.

According to The Shriver Report’s official website, the report was “produced in partnership with the Center for American Progress.” CAP is a liberal activist group, and the parent organization for the liberal Think Progress media outlet. It is also well-connected to liberal politicians Neera Tanden, who has worked for both Obama and Hillary Clinton, currently runs CAP. Obama recently hired CAP founder and former president John Podesta as his new counselor for 2014. Podesta also co-chaired Obama’s transition team.

The Heritage Foundation called Shriver’s main statistic about a wage gap “misleading” and noted that multiple variables factor into the issue including choices of occupations and child care. However, NBC failed to include any experts who disagreed with Shriver’s report.

According to Chittister in the report, “women are still one class of people who are set apart, separated, and given less value and worth by multiple religious traditions.”

“Women have been locked out of full humanity and full participation in religious institutions and society at large,” Chittister argued. “This marginalization of women masquerades as ‘protecting’ them and even ‘exalting’ them. Instead, these attitudes serve to deny the human race the fullness of female gifts and a female perspective on life.”

She continued saying, “As a result, women make up two-thirds of the hungry of this world. And women are two-thirds of the illiterate of this world. And women are two-thirds of the poorest of the poor, because they lack access to the resources and recognition men take for granted. That’s not an accident.

On 14 January 2014, Dictator-in-Chief Barack Hussein Obama all but announced his dictatorship to the world. At a Presser photo-op, Obama announced the irrelevancy of Congress when he stated firmly: “One of the things I’ll be emphasizing in this meeting is the fact that we are not just going to be waiting for legislation in order to make sure that we’re providing Americans the kind of help that they need.”

“I’ve got a pen and I’ve got a phone and I can use that pen to sign executive orders and take executive actions and administrative actions that move the ball forward…”

Our US Congress (you know…the House Representatives and Senators we elected to keep our country’s foundational structure intact) have betrayed the people almost as badly as has Obama. Obama betrayed Americans by lying about virtually everything he told them before his second term “election.” Congress has betrayed us by utilizing their 3-Monkey policy: ‘See nothing…Hear nothing…Say nothing’.

I have been writing that Obama planned his dictatorship well before he was elected and in 2008 when I wrote in my column “Is the USA Ready for an American Stalin?”: “After Obama is elected, all of his programs and people to keep him in power indefinitely – and to rid him of any and all opposition – will be firmly in place. You will not be able to vote him out of office. By the time he assumes the position of President of the United States it will already be too late. A democratic republic will last only so long as people of good will allow and fight for it. After they are gone – or removed – it is ended.”

I firmly believe that, without almost immediate action, we are almost to that point of irreversibility.

So basically if help someone lying dying in th street or need medical care, the Turkish Govt can now legally fine you up to 1 million and jail you for 3 years……jesus they are fucking sick. This is all designed to mke sure protestors do not protest and if they do they will leave you to die on the streets.

Not only is Snowden’s drivers license in Russia published on the internet, with his address…but then there’s this:

—-Edward Snowden has made some dangerous enemies. As the American intelligence community struggles to contain the public damage done by the former National Security Agency contractor’s revelations of mass domestic spying, intelligence operators have continued to seethe in very personal terms against the 30-year-old whistle-blower.

“In a world where I would not be restricted from killing an American, I personally would go and kill him myself,” a current NSA analyst told BuzzFeed. “A lot of people share this sentiment.”

“I would love to put a bullet in his head,” one Pentagon official, a former special forces officer, said bluntly. “I do not take pleasure in taking another human beings life, having to do it in uniform, but he is single-handedly the greatest traitor in American history.”

That violent hostility lies just beneath the surface of the domestic debate over NSA spying is still ongoing. Some members of Congress have hailed Snowden as a whistle-blower, the New York Times has called for clemency, and pundits regularly defend his actions on Sunday talk shows. In intelligence community circles, Snowden is considered a nothing short of a traitor in wartime.

“His name is cursed every day over here,” a defense contractor told BuzzFeed, speaking from an overseas intelligence collections base. “Most everyone I talk to says he needs to be tried and hung, forget the trial and just hang him.”

One Army intelligence officer even offered BuzzFeed a chillingly detailed fantasy.

“I think if we had the chance, we would end it very quickly,” he said. “Just casually walking on the streets of Moscow, coming back from buying his groceries. Going back to his flat and he is casually poked by a passerby. He thinks nothing of it at the time starts to feel a little woozy and thinks it’s a parasite from the local water. He goes home very innocently and next thing you know he dies in the shower.”

There is no indication that the United States has sought to take vengeance on Snowden, who is living in an undisclosed location in Russia without visible security measures, according to a recent Washington Post interview. And the intelligence operators who spoke to BuzzFeed on the condition of anonymity did not say they expected anyone to act on their desire for revenge. But their mood is widespread, people who regularly work with the intelligence community said.

Admin, that article was so hopeful and inspiring, it filled me with joy and excitement – like a Saturday night sinner at a Sunday tent revival! meeting. It’s so helpful to view these individual would-be weapons against Hillary in the larger context, from the perspective you presented.

I love that “Chappaquiddick Chauffeur” title for Teddy K.

The animal spy story was a crack up. Here’s an excerpt:
________

“Inside Israel’s Vast Network of Animal Spies
Your guide to the sharks, vultures and pigeons that just may be working for the Mossad”

As with all good conspiracy theories, there’s just enough historical precedent to resonate with believers. American and British forces used homing pigeons during World War II to carry messages, and the CIA reportedly trained dolphins, ravens and even cats for use in surveillance and weapons detection with varying degrees of success during the Cold War. Israel, too, has tried to cultivate some four-legged allies: Its security service was said to have trained gerbils for use in airport security, believing their keen sense of smell could help detect a rise in adrenalin. Problem was they couldn’t distinguish between a nervous flyer and a potential bomber.

snip

When: August 2013

The Animal: Stork

The Case: “Death on the Nile”

Egyptian authorities “arrested” the bird after a device was found attached to its leg. A fisherman in the Nile River southeast of Cairo first detained the suspicious stork and handed it over to the local police. The device turned out to be a wildlife tracker used by French scientists to trace the stork’s migrating patterns.

While cleared of spying, things did not end well for the stork. It was reportedly caught and eaten shortly after being released into a conservation area in southern Egypt. snip

snip

Even puppets sometimes need to answer for their actions. Abla Fahita, an Egyptian muppet-type character, was forced to go on national television recently to deny that her appearance in a phone commercial was actually a coded message to the now outlawed Muslim Brotherhood. snip

The difference Daily Puma/Wbb is, that an American Ambassador was tortured and killed.

And too, my knowledge, breaking the covenant we have with our serviceman that we will not leave them behind…Maybe Larry being ex CIA feels this sting especially. What a president this sets, and what ramifications, yet to be seen.

This guy is an Obama lover, a political hack and a paranoid with wings.

However, I cannot fault the argument he makes below.

Like the broken clock–he’s right twice a day.

And now just happens to be the witching hour for him and for “Big Boy” Christie.

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Straightforward? Not The Best Description Of Chris Christie — Or His Pal Karl Rove

A Commentary By Joe Conason

Friday, January 17, 2014

When Karl Rove praises a politician’s “straightforward” approach to an erupting scandal, it seems wise to expect that something very twisted will instead emerge in due course — and to consider his real objectives.

In this instance, the former Bush White House political boss — and current Republican super PAC godfather — was discussing Gov. Chris Christie’s response to “Bridgegate,” as the events surrounding the vengeful closure of part of the George Washington Bridge by the New Jersey governor’s aides is now called.

Appearing on “Fox News Sunday,” Rove said Christie “did himself a lot of good” during the famous two-hour press conference on the scandal when he sorrowfully announced the firing of a deputy chief of staff and a top state party official for “lying” to him about the bridge affair.

“I think his handling of this, being straightforward, taking action — saying, ‘I’m responsible’ — firing the people probably gives him some street cred with some tea party Republicans, who say, ‘That’s what we want in a leader, somebody who steps up and takes responsibility,’” said Rove. Pandering to the Fox audience, he went on to contrast the righteous Christie with Bill and Hillary Clinton, as well as President Barack Obama, and to note that the IRS and Benghazi “scandals” hadn’t gotten nearly enough attention compared with Bridgegate.

While Rove sticks a halo on the man his old boss Dubya used to call “Big Boy,” everyone else might wait for the documents and testimony forthcoming from investigations at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which operate the bridge; in both chambers of the New Jersey legislature; in the Department of Justice; and in the United States Senate.

Observers dazzled by Christie’s press conference performance should perhaps ask themselves how his top aides managed to pursue this scheme — evidently in revenge against the mayor of Fort Lee, the New Jersey commuter town so badly damaged by the closing of traffic lanes — under his nose.

They might ask why the governor continued to believe, as he says he did, that the controversial action resulted from a “traffic safety study” almost a month after the Port Authority’s top executive and two other PA officials testified Dec. 9, 2013, that no such study ever existed.

They might further ask about the very curious photograph published by The Wall Street Journal on Jan. 14, showing Christie yukking it up in public with David Wildstein, the Port Authority official who ordered the lane closures at the behest of Bridget Anne Kelly, last Sept. 11, three days into the traffic crisis in Fort Lee.

And they might then ask why Christie insisted — at the endless press conference where his candor so impressed Rove — that he has had “no contact with David Wildstein in a long time, a long time, well before the election.”

Christie’s description of his supposedly distant relationship with Wildstein is only one among many of his claims of innocence that contradict either the public record or common sense, or both. While awaiting additional information from Wildstein and other potentially immunized defendants, however, it may be worth considering the history that links Christie to Rove — and why the Republican strategist is so enamored with the New Jersey governor.

Their relationship was first exposed during the Bush administration’s U.S. Attorneys scandal, when investigations of the gross political abuse of the Justice Department by the Bush White House clearly implicated Rove. Among the U.S. Attorneys cited as dubious political appointees was Christie, whose law partner, a top Bush fundraiser and Republican operative, had forwarded his resume to Rove. Later, while still in the U.S. Attorney’s office — where he stage-managed a blatantly political election-year probe of Democratic Sen. Robert Menendez — Christie consulted with Rove about running for governor.

Christie is exactly the sort of presidential hopeful that a notorious bully like Rove prefers: a blustering loudmouth with a common touch; an experienced fundraiser who knows how to find the money; a Wall Street conservative capable of stirring up the base without scaring the independents. Without Christie as the GOP’s 2016 frontrunner, Rove has no plausible alternative to tea party hopefuls Rand Paul and Ted Cruz — and may see his own power, already waning, finally eclipsed.

The difference Daily Puma/Wbb is, that an American Ambassador was tortured and killed.
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I’m innocent, I want a lawyer and I take the Fifth. I took too much of the Fifth last night–Chivas. My head hurts. That is the difference between me and Joe Conason. Tomorrow I will be sober.

“In a world where I would not be restricted from killing an American, I personally would go and kill him myself,” a current NSA analyst told BuzzFeed. “A lot of people share this sentiment.”

“I would love to put a bullet in his head,” one Pentagon official, a former special forces officer, said bluntly. “I do not take pleasure in taking another human beings life, having to do it in uniform, but he is single-handedly the greatest traitor in American history.”

That violent hostility lies just beneath the surface of the domestic debate over NSA spying is still ongoing. Some members of Congress have hailed Snowden as a whistle-blower, the New York Times has called for clemency, and pundits regularly defend his actions on Sunday talk shows. In intelligence community circles, Snowden is considered a nothing short of a traitor in wartime.
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I may be losing my mind. No. I know I am. I agree with NYT on this issue. (Vomit). And these bloodthirsty cowboys who want to murder Snowden? They strike me as pathological, and chilling. Not patriotic. If you analyzed their motives, this has less to do with Snowden’s alleged betrayal of the nation, and more to do with exposing their operations. Don’t worry. I am not going Jake Tapper on you. I just think these people should keep their mouths shut. If their mission is covert, it makes no sense to frighten the horses, and cause even more distrust of our government.

If this is true obama should be impeached. He is too stupid to be president!
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Obama Aides: He Didn’t Know Extent of NSA Surveillance

“I think it was disturbing to most people, and I think he found it disturbing.”

President Obama doesn’t merely claim ignorance of the IRS’ targeting of politically conservative groups or the Department of Justice’s targeting of journalists: according to The New York Times, Obama was also ignorant of the extent of NSA surveillance. According to the Times, “aides said Mr. Obama was surprised to learn after leaks by Edward J. Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor, just how far the surveillance had gone.” David Plouffe, Obama’s advisor, said, “Things seem to have grown at the NSA. I think it was disturbing to most people, and I think he found it disturbing.”

President Obama has repeatedly claimed ignorance on scandals plaguing his administration.

In October, Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius said Obama didn’t now about failures of Healthcare.gov. In May, Obama said he knew nothing about the IRS scandal: “I can assure you that I certainly did not know anything about the IG report before the IG report had been leaked through the press.” That same month, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said Obama had no clue that the DOJ was targeting the Associated Press: “Other than press reports, we have no knowledge of any attempt by the Justice Department to seek phone records of the AP.”

In November 2012, Obama said he knew nothing about the scandal surrounding then-CIA Director David Petraeus. Carney denied in June 2012 that Obama knew anything about the Fast and Furious scandal: “[E]veryone knows the President did not know about this tactic until he heard about it through the media.”

Much of the attention in the run-up to the speech involved the NSA’s retention and search of so-called metadata—calling records, including calls made by U.S. citizens, that help the government identify potential terrorist relationships. And the president didn’t come close to what privacy advocates have wanted—a sharp culling of the program or its outright termination.

Instead, the goal of Friday’s announcement —as it has always been—was to reassure a skittish public both here and abroad that the program is being used responsibly. “This is a capability that needs to be preserved,” a senior administration official said.

I agree with you Wbb, and it is a crime that when our own government has been caught with their pants down, gathering our personal information without a court order, saving it up on their servers and these very people that are willing to say these things in public are probably not as bad as the real ‘cowboys’ that are hunting Snowden down for letting the public know just how corrupt our NSA and shadow men have become.

How long can Snowden hide and live with this going on?

Seems much worse than anything Nixon EVER did, and Nixon was a (fingers up) crook!

“Things seem to have grown at the NSA. I think it was disturbing to most people, and I think he found it disturbing.”

—-
“found it disturbing” – Really. That’s itc Pass the bong.

WTF, a real President would start lopping off heads, shut down this illegal behavior, C4 these servers, preventing the information from ever being recovered and start again a square one, following the Constitutional rights of privacy, and make sure there are safeguards in the law that prevent this from ever happening again.

Obama scratches his butt, takes a toke and chirps, “…it’s disturbing” and goes on playing at whatever game he is currently involved in, golf, cards or just watching men play sports on tv.

This is the United States, time for the adults to take back their country.

An example of idiocy and/or dishonesty: “There were just as many warnings before the original 911 as there was for Benghazi. I don’t recall democrats or the media demanding George Bush be investigated.”

We attended the congressional investigation which forced Condi Rice to testify. We recall vividly the many Democrats and the media demanding investigations of George W. Bush because we participated in the demands for investigations and explanations of why the Bill Clinton “bin laden memo” was not heeded. Indeed there were many many constant calls for investigations of Bush and all those in charge of the disaster that was 9/11 and our calls succeeded.

The dishonest will rewrite history in order to deceive but we will post to the facts.

The facts are that not only did Democrats constantly demand accountability and investigations on the 9/11 attacks, the facts are the investigations took place. One such investigation that the dishonest will claim not to “recall” came about because of the constant drumbeat for investigations by Democrats:

The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, also known as the 9/11 Commission, was set up on November 27, 2002, “to prepare a full and complete account of the circumstances surrounding the September 11 attacks”, including preparedness for and the immediate response to the attacks.

The commission was also mandated to provide recommendations designed to guard against future attacks.

Chaired by former New Jersey Governor Thomas Kean, the commission consisted of five Democrats and five Republicans. The commission was created by Congressional legislation, with the bill signed into law by President George W. Bush.

The commission’s final report was lengthy and based on extensive interviews and testimony. Its primary conclusion was that the failures of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency and Federal Bureau of Investigation permitted the terrorist attacks to occur and that had these agencies acted more wisely and more aggressively, the attacks could potentially have been prevented.

After the publication of its final report, the commission closed on August 21, 2004.[1]

I know another former federal law enforcement official who also has the attitude that Snowden is a traitor, deserving of execution. I don’t understand that kind of thinking. Maybe people with government agencies such as NSA, CIA, etc. have learned to put government before principle. Or, maybe it’s primarily people with such mindsets who seek positions with those agencies.

Regardless, I hope none of the Snowden haters get their hands on him. The man struck a blow for freedom. Freedom may no longer be valued and revered by some Americans, but thankfully, it is by a great number of others.

As I recall, Media Matters didn’t do a lot to ensure fair and balanced reporting about Hillary in 2008. However, I was glad to see this article about media’s manic efforts to blame only her for Benghazi.

BTW, you’re right, Admin. We have been negligent about wishing Meechelle a Happy Birthday. We did pay for a luxury birthday trip, though. lol
___________

Hillary Clinton’s name doesn’t appear in the bipartisan portions of the Senate review of the tragic September 2012 terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya, but you would not know that by looking at the media.

The report, released earlier in the week by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, has been a Rorschach test for the media, and as is almost always the case with Hillary Clinton, they are stretching to see something nefarious.

According to the Post, the report “is likely to provide fodder” for Clinton’s political opponents, even though the Post acknowledged that the only references to the former Secretary of State came from partisan Republicans in an addendum, not from the review itself.

CNN’s Wolf Blitzer said the report was “fueling heated debate, partisan debate, about her leadership,” while correspondent Elise Labbott insisted that Clinton would “have to address Benghazi during” any 2016 campaign.

Inexplicably, Washington Post blogger Jennifer Rubin accused media of being too “incurious” when it comes to Clinton and called Benghazi Clinton’s “drip, drip, drip problem.” Partisan Republicans are certainly happy that the media is carrying their water. Almost on cue, Sen. Marco Rubio said the report should justify further investigations … into Clinton.

The question of “leadership,” however, has been a lopsided one as it played out in the media’s campaign to use the Senate report as an indictment of Clinton.

Clinton has “deflected questions” about Benghazi, according to The New Yorker’s Amy Davidson, who argued that Clinton “does not come out well” in the Senate report — again, a report that never mentions Clinton. Davidson’s explanation? “The State Department made mistakes when [Clinton] was its leader.”

Clinton herself has acknowledged ultimate responsibility for any bureaucratic shortcomings that played a role to the tragedy in Benghazi. “I do feel responsible,” she said under questioning by Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN). “I feel responsible for the nearly 70,000 people who work for the State Department. I take it very seriously.”

So everybody agrees that Clinton had ultimate responsibility for leading the State Department.

That makes the question of what that leadership looks like critical, particularly since the media seems determined to parrot the right-wing narrative that Benghazi is a singular reflection on the former Secretary of State.

What is problematic about the way the media has used the Senate’s review as a reflection on Clinton’s leadership is that the reports ostensibly exploring Clinton’s leadership make no mention of the fact that one of her last acts as Secretary of State was to fully accept and begin implementing the findings of the Accountability Review Board, an independent, nonpartisan review panel that looked into what went wrong and how to prevent a similar tragedy in the future.

That review, like the Senate report that led to the latest bout of Benghazi mania, also singled out bureaucrats, not the Secretary of State, for scrutiny over diplomatic security failures. Four mid-ranked department officials were suspended for those failures; according to Ambassador Thomas Pickering, one of the chairmen of the ARB, their “future career[s]” are “finished.”

One of the pillars of the right-wing’s Benghazi hoax has been to accuse Clinton of being dismissive of the tragedy during her Congressional testimony when she asked “what difference, at this point, does it make” what led the attackers to target the diplomatic facility on that day.

Often left out of the sound bite is what Clinton said next: “It is our job to figure out what happened and do everything we can to prevent it from ever happening again.”

The Accountability Review Board laid out dozens of recommendations as to how to prevent future tragedies, recommendations largely in line with those contained in the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence report. Those recommendations are being implemented.

It’s woefully inadequate to leave that fact out of a discussion of leadership.”

Is the Obama marriage on the rocks? Astonishing claims emerge of ugly fights over that selfie, and even a Presidential affair

Michelle Obama alleged to have discovered her husband has been unfaithful
Reports claim they will separate at the end of his presidency in 2016
Follows claims in two books that couple neared divorce in early 2000′s

With invitations warning guests to ‘EBYC’ — Eat Before You Come — and rumours they’ll be dancing to star turns from Beyonce and her rapper husband Jay Z, it won’t be your usual White House knees-up.

Michelle Obama was 50 yesterday and President Barack Obama will be feting his redoubtable First Lady tonight with a party that will give them the chance to let their hair down and forget their troubles for a few hours.

Purse-lipped Washington etiquette experts have tutted at the informality of it all, but the Obamas have always been keen to appear accessible, even if the stand-offish reality is somewhat different.

The Obamas are the world’s most scrutinised couple at the best of times, but it will be rare to find a guest at the bash who won’t be secretly watching them with particular interest.

After all, the last time they were pictured together — at Nelson Mandela’s memorial — the First Lady was looking none too pleased as the her husband posed for a ‘selfie’ photograph with the leggy blonde Danish Prime Minister, Helle Thorning-Schmidt.

Indeed, if the U.S. tabloids are to be believed, the relationship of Washington’s golden couple is facing problems that go far beyond dirty looks.

Under the headline Obama Divorce Bombshell!, the National Enquirer claims their 21-year marriage has dissolved in a string of ugly fights that were prompted by the Mandela memorial incident and — far more outrageously — Mrs Obama’s discovery that Secret Service bodyguards had been covering up infidelity on her husband’s part.

It’s an allegation the White House has declined to comment on, though after Bill Clinton’s trouser-dropping scandals, Americans would be rather less sanguine about any extra-marital activity than the French appear to be over President Francois Hollande’s behaviour.

Mrs Obama, the Enquirer claims, intends to stand by her husband until his presidency is over, at which time he will move back to Hawaii, where he grew up, and she will stay in Washington with their children.

Greta Van Susteren documented the numerous ways the Obama administration have actively tried to shush Fox on Benghazi. Greta laid it out on her blog, including a story involving a “friend” of hers in the administration who tried to use Greta “for a dirty reason,” to stop Jennifer Griffin from “ruining her career,” which translated from Liberal-speak means stopping Griffin’s indepth reporting. ….

So let’s take a little walk in history…just a sample of how the Obama Administration tried to shut Fox News Channel’s reporting down:

In the early days after Benghazi, the State Department omitted only Fox News Channel from its conference call to all the media when it claimed to be answering questions about Benghazi for the media. Our friends in other media outlets were scandalized that Fox was not included and told us all about it. They were suspicious of State Department forgetting us/Fox and courageous to tip us off. The State Department claimed it was accident and not intentional.

And then shortly thereafter, there was the CIA briefing about Benghazi at the CIA for all the networks – except one: Fox News Channel. The CIA would not let Fox News Channel attend.

Then we had to listen to all the silliness about a video….what was with that? Did anyone ever really think that was legitimate?

And there were many times in the months and years since September 2012 when Obama Administration officials would make comments to suggest that Fox was just doing the Benghazi reporting for political reasons. The Administration was doing what it could to deter and demean the Fox News Channel investigation. They did not want to give us the facts ­ so their strategy was to attempt to belittle and demean our reporting.

As an aside, does the Obama Administration think politics is the reason the Democratically led Senate Intelligence Committee opened its investigation? Obviously not.

It is also interesting to note that The New York Times, thought by many to be the gold standard in journalism, recently reported that it was not Al Qaeda. According to the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee report, the NY Times reporting is wrong. (Yes, the same New York Times that reported there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. That was wrong, too.)

And then as I was sitting at my desk thinking about the reporting since September 2012, I thought about the weirdest of all and the worst of all for me personally! I remembered a disturbing phone call from a good friend in the Obama Administration. I have known this friend for years. The call was a short time after 9/11 (maybe Oct. 2012?) In the call, my friend told me that my colleague Jennifer Griffin, who was aggressively reporting on Benghazi, was wrong and that, as a favor to me, my friend in the Administration was telling me so that I could tell Jennifer so that she did not ruin her career. My friend was telling me to tell Jennifer to stop her reporting. Ruin her career?

n 20 plus years, I have never received a call to try and shut down a colleague – not that I even could – this was a first. Here is what I know: Jennifer is a class act….experienced..and a very responsible journalist. One of the absolute best in the business – no axe to grind, she just wants the facts.

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama banned U.S. eavesdropping on the leaders of close friends and allies on Friday and began reining in the vast collection of Americans’ phone data in a series of limited reforms triggered by Edward Snowden’s revelations.

In a major speech, Obama took steps to reassure Americans and foreigners alike that the United States will take into account privacy concerns highlighted by former spy contractor Snowden’s damaging disclosures about the sweep of monitoring activities of the National Security Agency (NSA).

GonzoTx, we stuffed ourselves with chocolates and Champagne. A big gift wrapped box with MoonOnPluto’s linked article is our Big Pink – Happy Birthday from all of us readers and commenters – gift to Mooch. We took the liberty of signing everyone’s name to the gift card.

We detest shows like Bachelor and Bachelorette. Never watched them, never will. We know lots of people love those shows. We also constantly see “liberals” on shows like the View fawn about these shows and make a big fuss over the “contestants”. These shows are on ABC so that network is in perpetual promotion mode for this crap. ABC and other Big Media promote their crap and hate shows like Duck Dynasty. Duck Dynasty is on cable and watched by people ABC and pals on Big Media disdain. When Phil of Duck Dynasty gave an interview to a magazine that reiterated his views on gays the yelps for boycotts and firings came loud and clear. We await the boycotts against ABC to begin:

“ABC’s ‘Bachelor’ Juan Pablo Galavis Says Gays Shouldn’t Be on the Show

“They’re more pervert in a sense. To me, the show would be too strong, too hard to watch on TV,” said the reality star.

ABC’s latest Bachelor says he doesn’t think that there should be a gay or bisexual person on the broadcast reality television show and described gays as “more pervert in a sense” in a new interview.

Juan Pablo Galavis, the 32-year-old star of The Bachelor who also appeared on the most recent season of The Bachelorette, made the remarks in an interview with The TV Page’s Sean Daly, who posted audio of the comments.

The writer asked whether ABC should have a gay or bisexual bachelor on the show. “No,” Pablo Galavis responded. “Just ’cause I respect them but, honestly, I don’t think it’s a good example for kids to watch that on TV. It’s hard, it’s hard, it’s a very thin line.”

He continued: “Obviously, people have their husband and wife and have kids, and that’s how we are brought up. Now there’s fathers having kids and all that, and it’s hard for me to understand that, too, in the sense of a household having people’s — two parents sleeping in the same bed and the kid going into bed. It’s confusing in a sense, but I respect them because they want to have kids, they want to be parents. It’s a scale; where do you put it on the scale, where’s the thin line to cross or not? You have to respect everybody’s desires, opinions and way of living. But it would be too hard for TV.”

“There’s this thing about gay people — it seems to me, I don’t know if I’m mistaken or not — I have a lot of friends like that, but they’re more pervert in a sense. To me, the show would be too strong, too hard to watch on TV,” Pablo Galavis said.

Pablo Galavis’ comments follow a December controversy that erupted after Duck Dynasty star Phil Robertson made remarks about gay people to GQ magazine and was temporarily suspended from the show. Those remarks ignited a firestorm, drawing pundits, celebrities and politicians to weigh in on the issue of the suspension.”

We are waiting for GLAD to demand firings. We are waiting for boycotts to be announced. We are waiting for denunciations of the ABC broadcast network which operates on public airwaves. We are waiting for license challenges. We are waiting for every person who appears on ABC to express their disgust with ABC sponsored homophobia.

We are waiting for GLAD to demand firings. We are waiting for boycotts to be announced. We are waiting for denunciations of the ABC broadcast network which operates on public airwaves. We are waiting for license challenges. We are waiting for every person who appears on ABC to express their disgust with ABC sponsored homophobia.
_________________________

It seems when it rains, it pours, for New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, as criticism has been pouring down on Christie during his heralded, yet somewhat “secret” fund raising trip to South Florida.

Not only is Christie receiving criticism from fellow Republicans, Democratic National Committee Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz is trying to make hay of events, as well. She announced “press availabilities” to point out what she suggests is a “hiding” Christie.

It would seem the NJ Gov is fast becoming the proverbial elephant in the room.

“This is ridiculous. It’s stupid, amateur hour,” said one major Scott donor, who plans to attend at least one of the events. “They took a little story and made it into a bigger one than was necessary. Trust me, this isn’t Rick making this a state secret.”

Meanwhile, a top Romney fund raiser, Brian Ballard is being right out front in his criticism. While it remains early in terms of sorting out the true fall-out from Christie’s so-called ‘BridgeGate,’ what does seem clear is that there’s a bit of blood in the water in Florida tonight and at least some sharks from both parties are circling.

“The guy, as a person, is horrific,” said Ballard, a top lobbyist and finance chair of former presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

Like other Romney insiders, Ballard deeply resents Christie for the way the governor sidled up to, and gushed about, President Barack Obama in the 2012 campaign’s final days just after Tropical Storm Sandy ruined parts of the Northeast’s coastline.

“Charlie Crist got a lot of grief for what was called a hug of Obama. But what Christie did to Obama isn’t suitable to say in a family newspaper,” Ballard said. “I firmly believe he helped swing that election in Obama’s favor just to help himself. I busted my ass for two years raising money and supporting Romney and this guy Christie just wiped his hands of us when we were no longer useful to him.”

David Brooks tells Gwen (I wrote a book featuring his Messiahness, Obama, but still was thought to be objective enough to host a debate between the Messiah and Hillary) Ifil that Benghazi is not really Hillary’s fault. He doesn’t think it will be an election issue. He thinks her she might have a problem getting elected in primary if someone from the Left runs. If she makes it through to the general election, Health Care will be her biggest obstacle. I presume he means her former employer’s screw-up will cost her votes by association.

The question they keep asking is: is snowden a hero or a traitor? The answer depends on who you are. If you are a nutcase, or an Obama supporter (yes, I know, a distinction without a difference) then he is a traitor. If you are a patriotic american who wants to preserve our freedom and liberty, then he is a hero. Case closed.

Judge Jeanine on her show on FOX News tonight is practically roping and hanging Hillary. She thinks Hillary should be prosecuted and I suppose put in prison for her role in Benghazi since it is totally Hillary’s fault according to Judge Jeanine. What a piece of work this gal is.

Judge Jeaine reminds me so much of a rabid Republican female version of Democrat Keith Olbermann. Remember him? Can’t remember the name of his show before he was fired.

Secretary of State John Kerry dismissed the new Egyptian constitution that guarantees freedom and religion and equal rights for women. 98% of voters approved of the new constitution in an election this week.
PJ Media reported, via Free Republic:

When millions of Egyptians wanted the Muslim Brotherhood leadership out, President Obama noted that Mohammed Morsi won his presidential post in an election.

When nearly 20 million Egyptians ­ more than 98 percent of votes cast ­ approved a new constitution to replace the one forged by Islamists, Secretary of State John Kerry said elections aren’t everything.

Egypt’s new constitution was written by a committee of 50 including women, Christians, one Salafist and one independent Islamist, while the last constitution was written by the Muslim Brotherhood and associated Islamists. The new document forbids “religion, race, gender or geography” from being the basis to form a political party while guaranteeing freedom of religion and granting, for the first time, Copts the right to build churches without permission of the president. Women are recognized as equals in Egyptians society.

Several people died in clashes surrounding the voting sparked by supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood, who boycotted the vote. “Going to the polls was risky because of those who were trying to use violence to scare people from voting, but the army and the police exerted a great effort to protect the polls and to give assurance to the people who would like to vote…It was a phenomenon to see crowds of women at each poll, many of whom queued for hours to vote. Some of them were singing and rejoicing, and even dancing, before and after they cast their vote…

…But in a statement issued today, Kerry said it was just one vote and again called for inclusiveness ­ a refrain the administration has used since the Morsi overthrown in an effort to get the Muslim Brotherhood back into the political landscape.

One of former President Bill Clinton’s favorite restaurants has eliminated its Friday buffet due to Obamacare.

“We regret we had to make this decision but unfortunately we face new expenses as a result of the Healthcare reform and the Friday Buffet, though wonderful, was not profitable and required extra staff which we can no longer sustain,” a notice at the Georgetown Italian restaurant’s website reads.

RUTH MARCUS: It’s just a tragic moment of — not just because the committee concluded that it was preventable, but some of the ways in which it was preventable, we knew after the embassy attacks back in the ’90s.

GWEN IFILL: So, if it could have been prevented, whose fault was it that it wasn’t, David?

DAVID BROOKS: Not Hillary Clinton’s, to be fair…. this is an operational matter. You are not expecting the secretary – in my view, to be fair, the Secretary of State is not in charge of something this, frankly, low-level, this operational. She’s in charge of the larger policy agenda.

This last point of Brooks cannot be over-emphasized. It’s why I’ve always given HRC a pass on Benghazi. The State Department is not a security agency, and basically is not in charge of any military-type operations – even concerning the military within its own walls.

I remember pointing out on Sept 12, 2012 that security even in the very peaceful Paris consulate and embassy is outsourced to a half-dozen Marines and to local French police. There is no State Dept security per se.

State does have security people, but they are trained only for watching the security cameras. They don’t have trained military staff. That comes from DOD when needed.

The Senate report shows Chris Stevens refusing support offered by General Ham of the Africa command and at the same time asking State for support. Not to speak ill of the dead, but by doing so, Stevens himself was knocking at the wrong door and was himself responsible for the lack of security in Benghazi when the attack came.

HRC took full responsibility because that’s the way she is – the buck stops here mindset –, which is a reaction very different from Panetta’s and Obama’s, who, along with Stevens, were the ones actually, operationally, responsible for the Benghazi debacle on the day it happened.

Brooks goes on to conclude that Benghazi will not be an issue in 2016. He says, “If she’s going to be stopped in the primaries, it will be by a challenge from her left; and if she’s stopped in the general election, it will be because of healthcare.”

Once a poster-boy for successful Middle Eastern democracy, the Turkish premier has recently attacked judicial power and civil liberties in the country. But to the residents of his teenage neighborhood, he can do no wrong.

That may not be surprising for this neighborhood, where Erdogan spent his teenage years. Elsewhere, however, others are beginning to question the motives of a leader who’s becoming increasingly divisive.

For the past month, the government has been embroiled in a scandal over illicit property deals that’s claimed three government ministers and dozens of parliament members. The unprecedented charges against officials from Erdogan’s AK Party and their families have set off a power struggle between the government and the informal movement led by exiled cleric Fethullah Gulen, who’s believed to have millions of followers. The scandal has also raised fears that Erdogan may not be the democratic role-model Western governments and investors had held him to be.

Since news of the police investigation broke on December 17, Erdogan and others in the ruling Islamist-leaning AK Party have accused Gulen’s supporters ­ who dominate the country’s police and judiciary ­ of orchestrating the affair for political reasons. The AK Party has also retaliated by firing hundreds of police officers and reassigning police chiefs and judicial prosecutors, while Erdogan has sped up plans to transfer judicial power from the Supreme Council of Judges and Prosecutors to the Justice Minister. This week, President Abdullah Gul, who’s seen as a more moderate force in the AK Party, signaled he may veto the move.

In Kasimpasa, however, admiration for Erdogan continues unabated. Twenty-eight-year-old Ismail, a security guard at a soccer stadium named after the prime minister, downplayed the political crisis.

“It’s similar to what’s been happening in Egypt,” he says. “But Turkey’s not going to turn out like that because all people here love Erdogan and are behind him.”

“What Erdogan is doing is telling the world that the Ottomans are back,” he adds. “Not in a violent or negative way, but that Turkey will become a global power.”

Incidentally, my Google alert for Hillary Clinton is churning out two or three 10-item alerts per day now, as opposed to the single alert every two or three days during her tenure at State.

A further difference between then and now is that almost all the items are negative – evidence of her enemies’ attempt to thwart her possible 2016 bid. Pundits are digging up all the dirt they can find about her.

One example is an article about how her Iraq war vote is again going to haunt her in 2016, alleged by presidential hopeful Brian Schweitzer and written up at length in The National Interest as “breaking news”.

Another example is writing up HRC’s suggestion of letting Israel attack Iran was somehow a matter of her pushing for such a green light, even though Gates was clear that HRC herself only put the suggestion on the table and did not favor it.

In all, seven of this morning’s alerts were downside spin.
_________________

As their fear of Hillary increases, their desperation reveals in itself this kind of negative spin overkill.

The progs and the cons must be unable to sleep nights, thinking about ways to bring Hillary down.

Hopefully, at some point these repeated hit pieces begin to have the opposite of the desired effect. If Hillary can win in the face of ongoing unfounded media attacks, it will strike a blow for independent thinking, and send a message to media that people no longer buy their propaganda and disapprove of their efforts to manipulate election outcomes.

Foxy–I wanted to comment on the Krauthammer video. I guess a lot of people are getting excited. Well, not me. In fact, I feel a certain sense of ennui, as so damned many things I could foresee, all bad, seem to come true. This keen ability, this coup e eil in politics to foresee the future, does not carry over into politics. And then, when someone says something like this, the natural tendency is to say, this is just bullshit. May-be. But here is what will happen on this health care bail out. It will not be presented to the American People the way Krauthammer envisions, which is to say as a bail out of billionaires who were complicit in creating this unsavory wealth transfer from the middle class to the millionaires and billionaires, through the least efficient mechanism know to man–namely the destruction of a functional market and the substitution in its stead and place of crony capitalism, which abjures competition and survives on political payola and fucks the middle class. No siree. That it is not we will hear from the truth tellers of big media. They will not characterize this bail-out for what it is, relief from a government created disaster and more of this obscene business of publicizing the losses and privatizing the profits. Instead, what we will hear from George Step and Fetch It and Ly’n Brian and all the other traitors will be a chorus of this is very unfortunate, but taxpayers must pay to ensure that their premiums do not go through the roof a year from now, because of the problem of adverse selection. No mention of the fact that this was a totally foreseeable consequence of the way the program was designated. Not even the chutzpa of Zeke can overcome the laws of economics. Oh I have no doubt that Obama could whistle up some Harvard expert to refute all this and when the inevitable happens they can blame it on sun flares. I can handle all this, because I have seen it before. What I cannot handle is the sheeple with the blank stare chewing their cud and saying brilliant things like don’t worry, its all politics, they will figure it out, follow the money–which is hearkens back to Churchill’s quote that the best argument against democracy is spending five minutes conversing with the average voter. Simply put, they are incapable of launching the revolution at the ballot box that is sine qua non if they are to have any hope of securing their future. They believe ly’n brian and step and fetch it George. Really, even if they were told the moon was made of green cheese. Which brings us back to the question of what will the RINO do when presented with a bill to bail out the insurance companies? Isn’t it obvious by now, Charles? They will politic against it and privately they will do the deal. Just like amnesty. As much as the democrat, the RINO believes in big government, only he thinks that his party should be in charge of the leviathan. The Chamber of commerce, and of course the health care industry want protection, and then they want the sweet deal they were promised. And in the past week we are hearing reports that the RINO is moving from repeal Obamacare to fix it. I know Boehner and McConnell well enough to know that they will tell these contributors–I have got a political problem right now. You must wait until after the election, and if we get control of both seats then we will work with the president to protect you and screw the American People. The only difference between us and Obama is we won’t fuck it up. I need to distance myself from this, it is all too damned predictable, same way with the other party, with Soros in charge.

Hopefully, at some point these repeated hit pieces begin to have the opposite of the desired effect.

Yes, hopefully… but to know if this will eventually be the case, you have to hope that the spin does not become the common wisdom among the low-info masses. I don’t know if that’s the case: who are these writers writing for?

I don’t think the printed press reaches the low-info people. At best, those people get their “information” from TV and radio, with which I have little contact myself.

If we consider that Big Media will be gunning for HRC in 2016, much will depend on the objectivity of Fox. Will Fox give her a chance?

Fox has Greta Van Susteren, and Joe Scarborough isn’t so bad either. Krauthammer is conservative but has much insight. I view him as objective, he doesn’t take freebee shots at anyone and sometimes takes shots at Republicans.

Hannity, on the other hand, is not objective but HRC could take him on in a face-to-face.

Glenn Beck has to be ignored. Rush Limbaugh is a bad guy, all spin and not an objective bone in his body. These two are Priebus’ guardian angels.

“I do. Big Brother Obama changed my perception of “The Sons of Liberty” this morning. In my youth, I was taught that they were patriots, doing what was necessary to protect what was to become The United States from tyranny. As it turned out, I was wrong; they were spies, lurking about the streets at night trying to see what the British were up to. How could I have been so wrong? I suppose I was blindsided by the revelation that the NSA had been gathering personal information about me through text messages, phone calls, and other nefarious ways. Luckily I have been shown the error of my ways . All quotes of Obama cited from The Guardian.

At the dawn of our Republic, a small, secret surveillance committee borne out of the “The Sons of Liberty” was established in Boston. The group’s members included Paul Revere, and at night they would patrol the streets, reporting back any signs that the British were preparing raids against America’s early Patriots.

Still I can’t help thinking that looking for British raiding parties is not exactly the same thing as raiding personal data about one’s own citizens in the hopes of finding a terrorist and thwarting an attack. Maybe it’s because I don’t think of myself as a terrorist even though I do have opinions about what my government should or should not do. Again, how could I be so wrong? Perhaps it’s because I didn’t think of the larger question.

We cannot prevent terrorist attacks or cyber-threats without some capability to penetrate digital communications – whether it’s to unravel a terrorist plot; to intercept malware that targets a stock exchange; to make sure air traffic control systems are not compromised; or to ensure that hackers do not empty your bank accounts.

On the other hand, there is considerable doubt about whether any terrorist plot has been prevented nor attacks on air traffic control, and no one stopped Target from losing my daughter’s atm and credit card information to hackers, causing her to wait while our credit union issued new cards and pin numbers. Unfortunately, she can not easily change her name and address, although I suppose she could ask that her cell phone number be changed. On the other hand, I don’t really care about the stock exchange being targeted because I am not wealthy enough to have stock (shocking selfish of me, I know). I also doubt that anyone would find emptying my bank account profitable. I do know, however, that there has been considerable effort expended to weaken the security of the internet by placing “back doors” into computer programs and operating systems, and forcing telephone companies to hand over “metadata,” text messages, possibly photos, and other personal information about my family’s mobile phone. Of course, Big Brother Obama does not believe that such things happen. How could I have been so wrong?

Let me repeat what I said when this story first broke – this program does not involve the content of phone calls, or the names of people making calls. Instead, it provides a record of phone numbers and the times and lengths of calls – meta-data that can be queried if and when we have a reasonable suspicion that a particular number is linked to a terrorist organization.

There is no mention of text messages. Perhaps, Obama has just not read The Guardian lately. Anyone with any sense of the grandiose position of the United States of America in the view of the rest of the world would have delighted in this comment from our Commander-in-Chief. It certainly justifies a number of our actions throughout the world, including the Wars on Terror that led us from Iraq to Afghanistan and the Drone attack which enable “protection” of many civilians and terrorists alike.

Meanwhile, a number of countries, including some who have loudly criticized the NSA, privately acknowledge that America has special responsibilities as the world’s only superpower; that our intelligence capabilities are critical to meeting these responsibilities; and that they themselves have relied on the information we obtain to protect their own people.

Finally, I am personally delighted to see that our President is acting swiftly to ensure my privacy in this digital age by creating at least two more committees to review and report to him on the several matters that most concern those citizens who think that Orwellian measures must be stopped now.

I believe in Change Now. Do you?
***

If you don’t want to wait, you can start using Don’t Track Me for your computer, phone, and credit cards and no I am not connected to them and this is not an ad, just a personal suggestion. Add your own suggestions in comments if you will”

If we consider that Big Media will be gunning for HRC in 2016, much will depend on the objectivity of Fox. Will Fox give her a chance?
__________________

I don’t have much faith in Fox’s objectivity, with the exception, of course, of Greta. Joe was not bad to Hillary in 2008, but as was said previously, back then FOX was trying to build ratings by slamming the other networks for their pro-Obama bias. Of course FOX was right to do so, and Hillary was treated decently by some of the FOX people during that time, but only because they were using her to make their point. After 2008, they were back to their usual narrow minded, sexist coverage of her.

Still, I know a lot of people who don’t generally care for FOX, but who consider Greta to be the one news anchor there who reports objectively. Maybe she’ll be able to make some headway in fighting the lies and half-truths.

Yes, foxy…China is gonna gobble us up. It’s all due to the debt, I believe. I shutter to think of what’s happening to the CA food belt and all the ranches and farms that have gone belly up due to the imposed “save-the-minnow” environmental policy. I think the Chinese would love to get their hands on this food belt.

It isn’t the fact that he has added 10 trillion to the debt, has 92 million people not working, operates on the infamous Chicago pay to play system, was either asleep at the switch or else complicit on Fast and Furious, IRS scandals, NASA, Benghazi, or that he lied about Obamacare, and committed fraud to win an election, none of that?

Yup, that’s that’s right. The reason they don’t like him is because he is black?

Yes siree.

Well then I take it that if a white man did the same thing, i.e. added 10 trillion to the debt, has 92 million people not working, operates on the infamous Chicago pay to play system, was either asleep at the switch or else complicit on Fast and Furious, IRS scandals, NASA, Benghazi, or that he lied about Obamacare, and committed fraud to win an election, that the unnamed people he is referring to would have no problem with it?

That is the logic of his position, yes.

Well, let me tell you something. It is the logic of an idiot and a subversive.

Notice how he has taken control of all communications, including the pictures taken of himself etc.

This is reminiscent of something.

I am a member of the Asian Art Museum and there is a new exhibit there by a painter.

This man paints pictures of the hamlet where he grew up.

He shows how little life has changed, as the rest of China, the urban centers have grown dramatically.

There is one painting of two working class men conversing over an x-ray which he is holding his hand as they stand in the middle of a field, parsing out what appears to be bad news.

There is another paining of a destitute peasant in squalid surrounding watching a basketball game. No sign of Dennis Rodman however. He is busy reforming North Korea and waiting for Obama to appoint him ambassador.

The notes to the exhibit have some interesting points to them which apply to our big media beloved liar in chief.

They talk about the realism, void as they put it, of the artistic style of the Cultural Revolution (1966-76) when art was deemed to serve a “political purpose” and for that truth was rejected.

The critic says his painting expose the fallacy behind revolutionary art and they refute the human tendency during a period of change to look for dramatic history changing moments, as opposed to normal life, the latter being a source of manipulation which sooner of later comes face to face with a reality which has changed for the worse.

Isn’t that exactly where we are today. Remember those pictures of Obama–they were in the same style as revolutionary art and they were everywhere. And the ignoranti in all social classes joined with big media in proclaiming him to be the second coming of Christ, based on a resume that was bare as a goat’s ass and long as a whores dream.

It was more than a leap of faith, it was an act of blind stupidity, worthy of a rube, to believe this shit. And if you made any attempt to explore his background you could see plainly that it was all a big lie. A lie promoted by big media as surrogate to the Washington DC interest, replete with the screams of racism and incitements to violence.

In countless way, Mr. Obama has torn this country apart. He has widened and deepened each and every one of the fault lines. And he has applied the tactics of the left when it endeavors to destroy a society so they can build a left wing dictatorship. This will become more and more clear in the days ahead.

Some unnamed spokesman for the State Dept said in or about the Senate report on Benghazi that “Hard decisions must be made when it comes to whether the United States should operate in dangerous overseas locations” and this Washington Times article reacts violently to that statement, predictably putting it on HRC’s shoulders: “This is the mindset Hillary wants to take to the White House.

Once upon a time US political leaders could at least identify the enemies of the United States. And, once upon a time, Hollywood could make movies about the enemies of the United States and the free world.

But those days are gone. Today US political leaders believe there are no enemies, no war – just “overseas contingency operations” and “man-caused disasters.”

And, Hollywood is just as delusional. The California cowards are afraid to link Islam and terror and afraid to portray the horrors of fanatical Islamists who declared war on America over a decade ago.

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit is latest example of Hollywood cowardice.

The movie starts out with scenes from a London campus on 9-11-2001. Yet, Hollywood chose not to show the actual towers crumbling to the ground. That would be too offensive – to Muslims. Instead any actual footage of the attack were left to the imagination.

Then, as the movie develops you discover the enemies who are set on blowing up New York City are Christians from Russia who get their orders from the local Orthodox priest in Deerborn, Michigan. Got that?

Anyway – Jack Ryan is able to stop the young church-going Christian before he was able to blow up Wall Street. Jack Ryan saves the day. Thank you, Jack Ryan. The US is once again safe from the dreaded Christian terrorists. You really must see this to believe it. You just can’t make this stuff up. We are living in a very non-serious time with very serious enemies. Someone needs to tell Hollywood that the Christians aren’t the ones plotting and scheming to blow up Wall Street.

EGYPT WARNS BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA: “If anything happens to stop General al-Sisi from becoming our next president, you will pay the price!”

Egyptians are aware of Obama’s anger at Saudi Arabia and the UAE for their full support of the Egyptian Army’s overthrow of President Mohamed Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood. They believe that Obama is cozying up to Iran in order to punish the Gulf States for their support. They also believe that there will be an attempt to assassinate General Sisi, who has tremendous support form the people to be a candidate in the upcoming presidential election. If anything happens to Sisi, Egyptians are pledging to hold the Obama Regime responsible because of his continued support for ousted Morsi.

So Andrew Cuomo is telling citizens of the United States that they are not welcome in the State of NY unless they agree with him! How arrogant! This comment should put an end to any thoughts he had about the WH. Cuomo – de Blassio – what did NY ever do to deserve these idiots?
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Gov. Cuomo: Pro-life people not welcome in New York

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo believes that pro-life activists along with anti-gay activists, and supporters of the Second Amendment, are not welcome in his state.

During a radio interview on Friday, Cuomo pointed out that Republicans were in the midst of a schism, where conservatives worked against moderate Republicans.

“Their problem is not me and the Democrats; their problem is themselves,” he said. “Who are they? Are they these extreme conservatives who are right-to-life, pro-assault-weapon, anti-gay? Is that who they are? Because if that’s who they are and they’re the extreme conservatives, they have no place in the state of New York, because that’s not who New Yorkers are.”

State Republicans blasted his comments, the New York Post reported, even as the governor walked them back on Sunday in an open letter to the newspaper.

A film festival wouldn’t be a film festival without a behind-the-scenes documentary based on the life of a leading Republican figure. Last year it was R.J Cutler’s “The World According to Dick Cheney,” and this year the buzz was all about the GOP’s 2012 Presidential hopeful, Mitt Romney.

But in a somewhat uncharacteristic departure from the expected Hollywood fare, Greg Whiteley offers a fairly flattering look into the life of Romney in his simply titled “MITT” at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. Although it wasn’t the filmmaker’s intention to make a film with any form of political persuasion.

“Audiences really get to see a certain vulnerability and weakness to Mitt. You look at someone like him who is wealthy, but being a part of human life you see his worries in those small moments,” Whiteley told FOX411. “The film is apolitical. We take great pains to avoid trying to tell you that you should or should not like Mitt Romney or that you should vote for him. My job was to shut
up and film.”

January 18, 2014|By Jessica Anderson, The Baltimore Sun
..Critics said Saturday that the latest problem to hit Maryland’s online health exchange — an incorrect help-line number that directed hundreds of callers to a Seattle-based pottery business — was another symptom of the poorly operating website.
“You can’t make this stuff up, and I guess if it wasn’t so serious, it could be funny,” said Senate Minority Leader David R. Brinkley, a Frederick County Republican.
The website mistakenly listed a 1-800 number that sent some Marylanders attempting to pick a health insurance provider to Seattle Pottery Supply instead of Maryland’s call center. The number appears under the words “State Advantage” and “call a representative.” The correct number for help shows up multiple times on the site before the incorrect number appears.http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2014-01-18/health/bs-md-health-exchange-folo-20140118_1_health-exchange-maryland-site-wrong-number

One function corrupting data before handing it over to the next one. It will be difficult to identify/fix all of those instances.

The only reason Benghazi is still an issue is because HRC took responsibility for it and its not a good example of leadership, so the Repugs are trying their damnedest to bring her down a couple of notches pre-2016.

Gowdy’s taking “What difference at this point does it make?” out of context for the umpteenth time is blatant evidence of this. He’s just trying, like all the Repugs are trying, to make HRC look like an indifferent leader whereas we know – and they should know for having grilled her on the subject for 2 days straight – that she took her responsibility very seriously.

Instead, with all the posturing and bluster of the Repugs during those hearings, no one asked HRC any of the questions that Gowdy throws at the press here.

If the Repugs are so interested in Benghazi and not just bringing down HRC, they would call in Panetta and grill him with the question of why military aid was not forthcoming. However, they don’t care about getting the real story of Benghazi, so they let Panetta off the hook. All they want to do is to keep Benghazi alive and rub “What difference at this point does it make?” into HRC’s nose.

Hard to believe she is Jackie’s offspring.
“Ambassador” Caroline Kennedy Already Offending Japan
…Caroline Kennedy, the US Ambassador to Tokyo, has intervened in the controversy over Japan’s annual dolphin hunts, denouncing them for their “inhumaneness”.
“Deeply concerned by inhumaneness of drive hunt dolphin killing,” she wrote on Twitter on Friday. “USG [the US Government] opposes drive hunt fisheries….”http://www.frontpagemag.com/2014/dgreenfield/ambassador-caroline-kennedy-already-offending-japan/

Everyone knows that President Obama loves to play golf. Since his inauguration in 2008, he has played over 100 rounds of golf, yet he received some unlikely criticism over his love of the game.

During an interview with Russian President Vladimir Putin, ABC’s George Stephanopoulos asked, if the president would “Care to make a friendly bet with President Obama on which country’s going to win more medals, the U.S. Or Russia?” [Click below to see Putin's response.]

Gowdy’s taking “What difference at this point does it make?” out of context for the umpteenth time is blatant evidence of this. He’s just trying, like all the Repugs are trying, to make HRC look like an indifferent leader whereas we know – and they should know for having grilled her on the subject for 2 days straight – that she took her responsibility very seriously.

Actor Robert De Niro has some advice for the president: Pick your battles.

“He’s a guy who means to do the right thing, he has to pick his battles, but his heart is in the right place,” De Niro told Fox News’s “The O’Reilly Factor” in a segment with Jesse Watters that aired Monday.

Proving once again that acting is not a job that requires a great deal of intelligence or common sense.

Even if it were true that O were not devious, which as we all know it’s not, since when did it become ok to be a well-meaning, heart’s-in-the-right-place failure – if your job is serving as the president of the United States of America?

Gowdy’s taking “What difference at this point does it make?” out of context for the umpteenth time is blatant evidence of this. He’s just trying, like all the Repugs are trying, to make HRC look like an indifferent leader whereas we know – and they should know for having grilled her on the subject for 2 days straight – that she took her responsibility very seriously.

In a radio interview last week, Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-NY) made some disparaging comments about pro-life conservatives, stating they had “no place in the state of New York because that’s not who New Yorkers are.”

Those remarks drew the ire of conservative talk show host Sean Hannity, who on his Monday radio program declared he had enough and was abandoning his home state, where he hosts his widely syndicated radio show and his high-rated Fox News Channel television program

Experts are scoffing at President Barack Obama’s apparent belief that widespread Muslim hatred of Jews is only decades old.

“Obama reveals that he has no idea, or doesn’t want to give the impression that he has any idea, about the reality of Islamic anti-Semitism,” said Robert Spencer, the author of many books on Islamic ideas and director of Jihad Watch.

“Anti-Semitism is hard-wired into Islam,” from its origins before 700, said Andrew Bostom, author of three books about Islam, including “The Legacy of Islamic Antisemitism,” which lists centuries of anti-Semitic hatred, murders, pogroms and apartheid-like discrimination.

Intellectuals, politicians and diplomats are loath to admit the centrality of anti-Semitism in Islamic beliefs, because it fuels conflict with Israel and the West and it can’t be fixed by Westerners, Bostom said. ”You’re dealing with an intractable situation, and people hate intractable situations,” he said, adding “diplomats are the worst.”

In an interview with The New Yorker magazine, Obama described the Muslim hatred of Israel as byproduct of recent fights, not as a consequence of Islam’s doctrinal objection to any Jewish government.

“With respect to Israel, the interests of Israel in stability and security are actually very closely aligned with the interests of the Sunni states,” Obama said.

The “Sunni states” are nations populated by Arabs who believe in the mainstream Sunni version of Islam. In contrast, Iran advocates the Shia version of Islam, which is endorsed by roughly 10 percent of Muslims.

“What’s preventing them from entering into even an informal alliance [against Shia-run Iran] with at least normalized diplomatic relations is not that their interests are profoundly in conflict but the Palestinian issue, as well as a long history of anti-Semitism that’s developed over the course of decades there, and anti-Arab sentiment that’s increased inside of Israel based on seeing [Jewish] buses being blown up,” Obama said.

A film festival wouldn’t be a film festival without a behind-the-scenes documentary based on the life of a leading Republican figure. Last year it was R.J Cutler’s “The World According to Dick Cheney,” and this year the buzz was all about the GOP’s 2012 Presidential hopeful, Mitt Romney.

But in a somewhat uncharacteristic departure from the expected Hollywood fare, Greg Whiteley offers a fairly flattering look into the life of Romney in his simply titled “MITT” at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. Although it wasn’t the filmmaker’s intention to make a film with any form of political persuasion.

“Audiences really get to see a certain vulnerability and weakness to Mitt. You look at someone like him who is wealthy, but being a part of human life you see his worries in those small moments,” Whiteley told FOX411. “The film is apolitical. We take great pains to avoid trying to tell you that you should or should not like Mitt Romney or that you should vote for him. My job was to shut
up and film.”
_________

I was not able to get jacked up about Mitt and Ryan in 2012, and opted instead to vote for the female candidate for the Green Party. Thankfully, she beat out Rozanne Barr to be the party’s presidential nominee. I couldn’t really get jacked up about that vote either. I couldn’t get excited about voting for someone representing a party in which Rozanne carried enough influence to be the runner-up. However, I really did want to vote for a woman, and the nominee seemed bright and capable.

Although I couldn’t support Mitt for POTUS, I did do a good bit of research about the man, and there were many, many positive stories about his character and personal/spiritual sense of responsibility to help others in need. There were quite a few accounts of his going way above and beyond to help others, even others who were not likely to share his ideology and belief system. He seems like a decent person, which is huge in today’s political arena.

So, I’m glad about that film, and appreciate your sharing that info, foxy. Mitt was given a rough time by MSM, the Dems, and even a bunch of Republicans. I’m glad he’s getting some credit. Lord knows there are too few admirable people in the world, and especially in politics.

I do not know Joe Trippi personally. He looks like a nice sort of guy. But he was with Howard Dean, and to run with that pack leaves a big question about him in my mind. Apart from that question, however, his analysis does not seem to be all that perceptive. . I suspect he would find the comparison insulting, but I have got to say it. He reminds me of that Delphic Oracle Charlie Cook, aka Dr. Obvious. But Joe is a nice guy and in the end, since the game is totally rigged, to screw the middle class, maybe that is the most we can realistically ask for or expect. If we could defeat Christie and McConnell that might be a start. As long as the RINO rules the roost, there is no hope.

Actor Robert De Niro
—————-
It is hard to say that the aforementioned Obama loving idiot is the stupidest man in Hollywood, when it comes to politics. Or just the biggest rube. Obviously, he has competition.

But this much I can say for sure. If there is a bigger rube in tinsel town, spare me the introduction. It is amazing how far this guy has gotten with so little talent. Al Pacino plays the same kind of characters. And unlike De Niro (De Nero?) Pacino is a bona fide actor.

Which leads me to wonder why an idiot like Bill-O has him on his show. Unless . . . birds of a feather. Last time I looked, Bill O was having dinner with Al Sharpton at Sylvia’s in Harlem. So Bill-O does play the field.

It amazes me how few conservatives can see through these two four flushers. Its not hard if you pay attention.

It really is a tale of two cities ­ this time with the tony Upper East Side getting the shaft!

Huge swaths of the city’s wealthiest neighborhood had been not been plowed by early Tuesday evening, leaving 1-percenters out in the cold, according to the city’s own map of snow-plower activity.

“He is trying to get us back. He is very divisive and political,” said writer and life-long Upper East Side mom Molly Jong Fast of Mayor de Blasio.

“By not plowing the Upper East Side, he is saying, ‘I’m not one of them.’ But we have everyone in this area on the Upper East Side. We have rich people, middle class people, and housing projects. We have it all.”

There appeared to be no snow plowing between East 59th and 79th Streets and between Second and Fifth Avenues.

I can’t believe de Blasio could do this. He is putting everyone in danger,” said Barbara Tamerin, who was using ski poles to get around 81st Street and Lexington Avenue.

“What is he thinking? We’re supposed to get up to a foot of snow and nobody on the Upper East Side is supposed to blink an eye? I can barely get around and I’m on snow shoes! All of the buses are stuck and can’t go anywhere. He’s crazy. We need Mayor Bloomberg back!”

Martin Cisse, 45, who works at a flower shop near 85th and Lex, said he can’t understand why the city would fail to plow the UES.

“DeBlasio is trying to hurt the more wealthy people by ignoring us but there’s no logic to that,” Cisse said.

Story from News Max about the lack of success Priebus has had since taking over as the Pubs’ head dude. Perhaps a little less time and energy trying to smear Hillary, and a little more time actually working is called for, Priebo. Whatcha think?
_________

GOP Image Still Muddled a Year After Priebus Report

January 20, 2014
News Max
)Snit)

In the past year, Priebus has launched new efforts to reach out to racial and ethnic minorities, hired about 170 state-level staff — with more planned — and invested in technology to better track potential voters, a tactic Republicans pioneered and Democrats have perfected over the past eight years. He also renewed efforts to win over Hispanics nationally with voter outreach staffers.

But these structural changes can end the GOP’s White House losing streak only if its messengers fulfill the report’s larger goal: “Change course, modernize the party and learn once again how to appeal to more people.”

Since losing the 2012 presidential election, Republicans have continued to slip in public approval. According to a recent Gallup poll, 32 percent have a favorable opinion of the GOP now, compared with 43 percent immediately after President Barack Obama’s re-election. Democrats were viewed favorably by 42 percent, also down from a year ago.

“DeBlasio is trying to hurt the more wealthy people by ignoring us but there’s no logic to that,” Cisse said.
__________

DeBlasio made a point about equity in snow removal a few weeks ago, in during the previous snow storm, noting that in the past, poorer neighborhoods had not not received city snow plow services to the degree that other areas had. Obviously things need to be fair, but this dude is not attempting to achieve fairness. He’s going for retribution. Way to contribute to the class and race wars Obama and Holder have spent 5 years promoting.

Proving once again that acting is not a job that requires a great deal of intelligence or common sense.

Even if it were true that O were not devious, which as we all know it’s not, since when did it become ok to be a well-meaning, heart’s-in-the-right-place failure – if your job is serving as the president of the United States of America?

But I think the Putin hatred stems from another source: He has done all that was necessary to raise Russia out of the ashes of the Soviet Union and into a world power once again, i.e., one that is more widely respected on the world scene than the United States.

It is proof positive that the U.S. did not “win” the Cold War just because the Soviet Union broke up. Everyone won the Cold War simply by the fact that it was over: no more saber-rattling, no more Balance of Terror. Everybody could get down to living their lives peacefully and, in the longer run of two or three decades, we now see that the Russians won more than we did by ending that Cold War.

Putin is largely responsible for that Russian turn-around. In a broader sense, this turn-around is proof of the Japanese maxim “Loser is Winner”.

“Loser is Winner” means that if you win, you get your lollipop; but if you lose, you get to learn something so you come back playing better the next time. “Loser is Winner” is all about learning. The Russians learned their Cold War lesson well, and all we did was feel good about ourselves.

During the 2012 presidential campaign, somehow each and every Republican presidential contender had a sink thrown at him (or her) via what reporters call “investigative journalism.” Every time a Republican rose in the polls, the media tried to knock him or her down, like a game of Whack-a-Mole.

The very last man standing was Mitt Romney, who didn’t receive the official “Gotcha!” from The Washington Post until May, with a 5,000-word opus on “Teenage Haircutgate.” That’s why it’s so strange that the national media would decide so early it was time for journalistic carpet bombing of the Great Squishy Northeastern Hope of 2016, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie.

It was just weeks ago that NBC’s Matt Lauer was swooning over Christie and lining him up to denounce House Republicans as cruel and miserly on superstorm Sandy subsidies. After he won, CBS reporter/former Biden aide Chip Reid was announcing that Christie “wanted a big reelection victory, in part, to show that Republicans who favor consensus over ideological purity can win – even in blue states like New Jersey.” CBS claimed wins by Christie in New Jersey and liberal Terry McAuliffe in Virginia showed America was engaged in a “move to the middle.”

Christie can forget all that hugging and mugging with Obama in 2012, as if that was going to inoculate him forever. Democrats have been harping for weeks – especially on their propaganda channel MSNBC – that a “Bridgegate” scandal was going to be Christie’s undoing.

On January 8, the scandal exploded. The Bergen Record revealed Christie’s deputy chief of staff Bridget Anne Kelly declaring in an e-mail in September “Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee.” The Democratic mayor of Fort Lee wouldn’t endorse Christie for re-election, so Christie aides decided to punish the public on the George Washington Bridge that goes from Fort Lee into New York City.

There goes the image of Christie “favoring consensus.”

The same national press that conducted a blackout of the trial of Philadelphia murderer Kermit Gosnell as lawyers exposed his horrific late-term abortion mill – that was dismissed as a “local story” – decided a few autumn days of traffic jams in Bergen County to be the hottest outrage for everyone from Jacksonville to Boise. In fact, their burst of reporting indicated they believed this was the most important story in the world – by far.

In the first two days of the story after the e-mails on the manufactured traffic jams came to light, ABC, CBS and NBC devoted 88 minutes of breathless coverage to the story. To put their transparently partisan aggression into perspective, that’s 88 minutes in two days compared to two minutes of coverage in the last six months of the IRS-Tea-Party-targeting scandal.

In less than a week, there was 44 times as much coverage of The Bridge than to the IRS in six months. Had Christie absolutely zero national potential or ambitions, the traffic jams would have remained a local story. But he’s a presidential hopeful who would challenge the presumptive Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton – and so, it was time to take him down.

The national Democrats are grateful. Hand in glove with the negative media coverage, DNC communications director Mo Elleithee sent out a fundraising e-mail. “Before the next campaign starts, we need to make sure that Americans across the country know the real Chris Christie, and that Democrats have the resources to keep him out of national office. Chip in $10 to make sure we can stop Chris Christie.”

What’s not in any doubt is that the publicity and fundraising aims of the White House and the Democratic National Committee line up remarkably well with the “news agenda” of our national TV networks and newspapers.

Even conservative pundits have insisted that when Gov. Christie maintained during his endless press conference that this was planned, he had better be telling the truth or his career is finished.

At the risk of sounding casual about the truth, it could be argued that lying your face off to the press and the American people didn’t keep Barack Obama from being elected or re-elected.

Our “objective” journalists would be worthy of respect if they observed a single standard on truth-telling and political scandal coverage. But once again, with “Bridgegate,” we are reminded this is a pipe dream.

Is it just me or is Michelle acting like she is loosing her marbles? That kind of crap is not normal for her. She just came back from a stay out in the middle of nowhere in a “celebrity” house holed up with a bunch of Democratic enforcers (ValJar, Mrs Eric Holder, Oprah’s keeper of the dream named Gale, and various other goons) and she acts like she wants to be medicated. What is going on?

Sure. Invite them in. Give them special treatment. Why not? After all – they only want to kill us!
====

Muslim Brotherhood gets security pass at JFK

WASHINGTON ­ Egyptian members of the Muslim Brotherhood dodged extra security screening at JFK Airport under VIP treatment provided by the State Department, internal government documents reveal.

The special treatment, known as “port courtesy,” was extended during March and April 2012, according to documents compiled by the department and turned over to the Investigative Project on Terrorism as part of a Freedom of Information Act request.

The perk is normally reserved for visiting dignitaries.

The documents show how State and security officials laid out the welcome mat for members of the Muslim Brotherhood and its Freedom and Justice Party even before they took control of the Egyptian government in June 2012.

One visiting delegate, Abdul Mawgoud Dardery, was escorted through checkpoints at JFK.

“We did not hear anything further from the MB [Muslim Brotherhood] so we assume to departure went smoothly,” a department official reported.

Dardery, a senior Brotherhood member, avoided a “secondary inspection,” in which agents go through baggage and electronic equipment of passengers who might be considered security risks.

The Brotherhood won a plurality in the Egyptian parliament and its candidate, Mohammed Morsi, was elected president before being overthrown in a military-backed coup in July 2013.

Mormaer, Short answer IDK. I always think of her as optimizing everything she can for herself, so I’d say it is the first step toward something big. Not too long ago she had young girls visit the WH and the focus was seemed to be associated / Hollywood – not that I paid much attention. That group at Oprah’s in Hawaii had the potential to line up some thing or things big. Back to now, I’m kind of curious to know what she looked like when making that shot, but to quote an old song, I really don’t want to know.
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Nightmare on K St. — the 2013 sequel
1/21/14. Snip While some upstarts defied the trend, most lobby shops couldn’t escape the downward pull of a historically unproductive Congress that stalled on big-ticket items like immigration and tax reform. The government shutdown didn’t help, either. “It stifled a considerable amount of activity, and it LED TO THE BUSINESS COMMUNITY ASKING, RIGHTLY, DO THEY NEED TO BE ENGAGED AT THIS MOMENT,” said Al Mottur, the managing partner of Brownstein Hyatt Farber Shreck’s Washington office.
Industry king Patton Boggs took it hard on the chin, earning $40.2 million in lobbying fees for 2013 — a 13 percent drop from the $46.2 million the firm earned the prior year.
“The lobbying industry responds to what happens in Congress, and the ambitions were certainly grander than the execution. That impacted us,” said Kevin O’Neill, Patton Boggs’s deputy chairman of the public policy department.
Brownstein Hyatt suffered a drop as well, going from $22.5 million in lobbying fees during 2012 to $22.2 million last year. [Down 1.4%? Poor babies.]
Other VICTIMS of the slump included Williams & Jensen, which made $17.6 million in lobbying fees after banking around $18 million in 2012, [ 2.3% oh the humanity ] and Van Scoyoc Associates, which went from $22.5 million for lobbying revenue in 2012 to $21.4 million last year.[ 5 %. Time for food stamps?]
Steve Hart, Williams & Jensen’s chairman and CEO, cast blame on the gummed-up legislative process on Capitol Hill, which, at times, left lobbyists with little to do.
“If Harry Reid doesn’t allow votes in the Senate, not much can happen in the lobbying world,” Hart said sniphttp://thehill.com/business-a-lobbying/business-a-lobbying/196063-nightmare-on-k-st-the-2013-sequel

I’ve already placed opinions within this article but I’m not smart enough to appreciate the last sentence. I thought everybit of the grid lock was Boehner’s fault.

We know that the birth certificate is a forgery, but who is Soebarkah? And did Ann Soetoro and Loretta Fuddy really belong to the same Indonesian Muslim cult? This is excellent reporting. I hope the answers will eventually be found.
====

Barack Hussein Soebarkah?

One of the unexplained mysteries in the scanty documentation of the early life of the 45th President of the United States is the appearance of the name Soebarkah as his last name on an official document filled out by his mother.

In a recent contribution to American Thinker, Nick Chase offers very persuasive evidence that the long-form birth certificate released by Obama is a forgery.

While in the midst of developing an argument supporting the idea that Obama was adopted by the Indonesian Lolo Soetoro, Chase states:

Finally, we have Stanley Ann Soetoro’s 1968 application to extend her 1965 passport (now destroyed) for an additional two years, as shown in Figure PPA.

On the second page of the application, Ann moved to exclude her son Barack Hussein Obama (Soebarkah) from her passport, but the item has been crossed out — perhaps on the advice of the consulate in Jakarta, as this would have left seven-year-old Barry passportless — so it didn’t happen.

The appendage “(Soebarkah)” has never been satisfactorily explained by anyone, and I certainly don’t know what “Soebarkah” means, but it does seem to indicate a name change or change in citizenship status for the boy.

Clearly, just what constitutes “a satisfactory explanation” varies with respect to persons, subject matter, context, and so forth.

Believe it or not, the reason may be linked to one Loretta Fuddy.

Yes, that Loretta Fuddy — the Hawaii state health director who approved the release of Obama’s long-form birth certificate and who has apparently succumbed to a nasty case of post random plane crash induced arrhythmia.

Ann Soetoro and Loretta Fuddy appear to have one very odd thing in common: both have been linked to the Subud cult, which originated in, of all places, Indonesia and was founded by the Javanese Muslim Muhammed Subuh.

Gov. Terry McAuliffe intends to wrest the power to expand Medicaid away from a legislative commission and put it in his own hands, one of several moves threatening to undermine the new governor’s courtship of the GOP-controlled General Assembly.

McAuliffe (D) announced Monday that he will seek that authority through a proposed budget amendment if the Medicaid Innovation and Reform Commission does not agree within the next 60 days to enroll 400,000 more Virginians into the federal-state health-care program for the poor. Republicans flatly opposed his proposal on policy grounds and procedural ones: The governor does not have the right, they said, to propose amendments this early in the process.

“It doesn’t help when the governor continually does things of this nature,” House Majority Leader M. Kirkland Cox (R-Colonial Heights) said when asked whether the proposal would have a bearing on bipartisan cooperation.

McAuliffe devoted the nine weeks between Election Day and his inauguration to ardently wooing Republicans with moderate Cabinet picks, face-to-face meetings and lavish praise for the outgoing GOP governor, Robert F. McDonnell.

But he spent his first week on the job antagonizing a good number of them. Republicans who had initially succumbed to McAuliffe’s charm offensive were already bristling at his liberal rhetoric, planning to squash one of his political appointments and recoiling from his strong push for Medicaid expansion.

This article starts with a quote from Barbara Bush, wife and mother of presidents, who opposes a Jeb Bush run just because Jeb would be too dynastic-sounding.

From there, the article goes on to say:

This is a not a question of Clinton’s politics or her experience. As a former senator and secretary of state she is clearly qualified. But her place in the Clinton family should remove her from consideration….

Now, really: “She is clearly qualified” but should remove herself from the running because she’s married to a former president?

The author of this crap is Nicole Hemmer of an opinion column at US News. Forget about Jeb and how unqualified he is…. Where was Hemmer when the second Bush ran for President, already establishing a dynasty of unqualified, inarticulate presidents?

Anyway, this article is typical of the kind of trash coming through the pipeline of my Hillary Google Alert these days. The Hillary hate machine is churning out this shit at a sickening pace.

Our “objective” journalists would be worthy of respect if they observed a single standard on truth-telling and political scandal coverage. But once again, with “Bridgegate,” we are reminded this is a pipe dream.

___________

Right on both counts wbb. The single standard for reporting news, whether political or otherwise, should indeed be truth. And, as we saw with “bridgegate” and countless other media reports, the hope that these so-called journalists will embrace truth as the standard is a pipe dream.

Our best hope for mitigating the damage done to truth by those who are entrusted with the responsibility of reporting it is to continue to expose their lies, as is done here at Big Pink, and other sources, and to refuse to watch/listen to/read the media outlets who spread lies and propaganda in order to advance a particular ideology, or to damage an opposing one. We must also refuse to purchase the products their sponsors sell. We need to reach more people, which will require more resources and more focused, coordinated efforts.

jesw, they do continue to lob their little bits of contrived smut at Hillary. This morning, Real Clear Politics had an article saying that Hillary would be the party nominee, unless someone less conservative challenged her. That statement has repeatedly turned up in anti-Hillary articles: “unless someone less conservative (or more liberal) runs against her in the primary”. I believe they have themselves a talking point there. They continue to imply that Hillary has got the nomination if she wants it, quickly followed by the qualifier, the talking point – “unless someone less conservative challenges her”.

Then, there is the inevitable “Benghazi” qualifier – “But she’ll have to deal with Benghazi in the general election, if she’s nominated”. WTF! What else can she do or say about Benghazi? She took responsibility.

Of course the message to Dems is – ‘Well, she can have the nomination if she wants it, but she won’t get elected because of Benghazi. So why give her the nomination’.

And, the ongoing message to the progs is: ‘She’s will absolutely be the party nominee if someone more progressive doesn’t challenge her. Now get ready Martha, or someone… anyone.”

I didn’t link the article. It quotes Joe (the wuss) Lieberman. Honestly I didn’t even read it all. Regardless of what else the article said, the message was clear from the first sentence. It’s always the same as the previous day’s message.

We need a new verb, one that describes the lame effort to destroy Hillary’s chances – again. I mean if a group takes the same action repeatedly, always working toward the same goal, isn’t a specific word or phrase to described that action called-for?

An interesting quote from Michael Ledeen at PJ Media, reacting to Bob Gates book. (Note: my thought is that we are undergoing a generational change, a technological change, and a global change which required circumspection, analysis and coherent policy. And what we got from Obama is none of the above. But behind him stood big media, chafing at erosion of their own power and influence. If the Republican Party is smart enough to not play their game, I believe that big media is toast. They cannot survive on the tripe they peddle and are no longer a source of truth. But the unfortunate thing is the capability of the RINO to shed these body louses from the body politic assumes about them facts not in evidence. So ever two years they go into the same crooked card game, with the same crooked dealer, get fleeced, and like the old Brooklyn Dodgers, tell their contributors there’s always next season. Back to Ledeen. The following quote could be paraphrased thusly. Under Obama, the inmates are running the asylum. These activist products of a failed educational system, which begets policy failure on every front. There is no reckoning with stupid and energetic. And stupid comes in all races, genders and educational backgrounds, particularly Harvard.
———————–
Ledeen to Gates:

You were an old-fashioned professional — a throwback to the WASP elite that ruled Washington in your formative years — surrounded by a crowd of new-breed activists who, as products of our failed educational system (about which I wish you had had more to say; after all, you were president of Texas A&M for several years), don’t know scuff from Shinola about the world and its history. You don’t understand them very well, nor their intimate bond with the president. You remark that Obama lacks passion (quoting his line to you that he ran for president in considerable part because he was “bored in the Senate”), yet those phalanxes of activists are very passionate, and they are there because he wants them there. Did you not consider the possibility that they are the foot soldiers for Obama’s passions?

Back Trippi. I slept on what I said, and realized I failed to make the larger point. This SOB has not learned anything new since 2008. He still drones on about demographic change, electoral college advantage, etc. like they are some kind of Holy Grail. I think he thinks they have got election fraud down to a fine science, but is reluctant to say so, for obvious reasons. I do not see much insight from the guy. Kinda like Howie. Admin may disagree with me on Trippi, but that is my informed (or uninformed) opinion.

You have got to be kidding! Patton, where are you? i am sure this originated from the WH. I just can not stand this, I just can’t.
**************************

Change in military dress policy will allow for turbans, beards if worn for religious reasons: Report

on January 22, 2014 at 10:19 AM, updated January 22, 2014 at 10:27 AM

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A change in military dress regulations will let members wear clothing items such as turbans if worn for religious reasons. (Contributed photo/Wikipedia)

The Pentagon is expected to announce changes today to rules governing religious items and uniform regulations, NBC News is reporting.

The change would allow beards, some religious tattoos and turbans to be worn by members in uniform.

NBC News obtained a draft of Department of Defense instructions that said the military will make every effort to accommodate “individual expressions of sincerely held beliefs” of service members. The memo said unless the items have an adverse impact on readiness, order or discipline, commanders will be allowed to grant special permission for personnel to wear religious article while in uniform.

Those articles could include a Jewish service member wearing a yarmulke or a Muslim service member wearing a beard and carrying prayer beads. The directive will also cover Wiccan service members, a religion now covered under Pentagon guidelines.

Requests can be denied when the “needs of mission accomplishment outweigh the needs of the service member,” the memo states.

The change comes on the heels of a request by a U.S. Army major who is a Sikh American to be allowed to wear a turban and maintain long hair and a beard. The same requests has been made by Sikhs and other religious groups in the past.

According to the NBC report, there are 3 Sikhs in the U.S. military and about 3,700 Muslims, 6,300 Buddhists and 1,500 Wiccans.

Larry has the following video posted at his site. It was sent to him by a buddy of his in the SEALS. And it depicts an Obamacare clinic which has just opened in Chicago.

I have it on good authority that the (witch) doctor has no undergraduate records, was admitted to Harvard Medical School on an affirmative action scholarship, was editor of the MIA Harvard Medical Reviewand he administers medicine with the same sort of panache as Obama governs, which is to say disastrously.

The death panels depicted in another video are a throwback to the Chicago Stockyards, which muckrakers loved to write about, all for the greater glory of Obama, and his army of Cretan journalists and organ grinder monkeys. The screams are accompanied by Wagnerian Opera music.
—————————————————————

Sikhs make up a huge percent of Indian military. These are fearless people strongly patriotic and will do anything for their country. Theirs is also traditionally called the warrior class/caste. I would not cast aspersions for his beliefs because he is ready to give his life for his (or his parents’) adopted country. What are you ready for? And comparing his appearance to burka is even more ludicrous. Educate yourself first.

With Obamacare, Obama, Zeke, HHS and the senators who pushed it through without reading it entered into a new realm of human depravity. Now, they are working on the problem of adverse selection, which they failed to recognize when the designed the program in a way which was thought to be smart politically, by gerrymandering the young, but has predictably turned out to be the Achilles heel of the entire misbegotten program. The only way around it is to force young people–his most loyal group to march off the gang plank. But, but, but people don’t like me because he is black. . . . That is the sound of human depravity.

I see no problem with this. I think privates should be permitted to dress up like generals, and generals should be allowed to wear nothing at all, like General Wingate, the British Guerilla leader in Burma, PROVIDED (In)Justice John Roberts finds it in his expanded consciousness (surely not in the Constitution) to recognize this as a fundamental right in the penumbra of the Ninth Amendment. The dissent could cite Holmes who argued that a Boston Police chief who criticized the corrupt mayor (Honey Fitz if I am not mistaken–a relative of Teddy–a rotten apple does not fall far from the tree) that he has a right to free speech, but he has no right to be a police chief.

Obama also thinks women in the military should be treated equally, so that means the burqa can be worn on the front lines and in the service when used for ‘religious purposes’.
———————–
Obama is too far back in the ranks. He belongs on the front line. Make him point man of a SEAL team. He claims the credit, it is high time he bore some of the risk. Lets be clear on the kind of SEAL team I am talking about. The kind that sit on rocks, bark and eat fish. A menace to navigation.

Change in military dress policy will allow for turbans, beards if worn for religious reasons: Report

on January 22, 2014 at 10:19 AM, updated January 22, 2014 at 10:27 AM

I really don’t see how anyone in the military, especially the top brass, could have any respect for teh one anymore. The one place where it should be AGREED by all that uniformity is VITAL to SUCCESS that the CIC would promote that. Instead, he celebrates diversity in the way most apt to create friction WITHIN the ranks.

…. The single standard for reporting news, whether political or otherwise, should indeed be truth….
Our best hope for mitigating the damage… is to continue to expose their lies,

… to refuse to watch/listen to/read the media outlets who spread lies….

refuse to purchase the products their sponsors sell….

We need to reach more people, which will require more resources and more focused, coordinated efforts.

I think the only one of your suggestions that will hit a nerve is “refuse to purchase the products their sponsors sell”; but more can be done than just refusing to purchase: we can write to their sponsors and ask them if they really want to support untruthful news coverage, or sexism, depending on what eggs you the most about the coverage. That worked on Letterman’s lewd jokes about Sarah Palin and her daughter…. He had to apologize on TV.

Refusing to “watch/listen to/read” is fine for individuals but there is no way to reach the masses with that message, because who is going to listen to you rather than the media? Besides, ‘not listening’ is part of today’s communication problem in the US, as we were saying the other day.

“Expose their lies”? Sure, but getting this exposure beyond our own little circle “will require more resources and more focused, coordinated efforts”, as you say.

Maybe there is a middle road, one that will help our girl as well: joining Ready for Hillary and educating ourselves and others in the issues that will stand out in 2016.

I can’t believe that West just realized this. Probably he was reluctant to say it publicly before now.
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Allen West: Obama May Want His Policies to Fail

With a record 20 percent of households on food stamps, former Florida Rep. Allen West says it’s time to stop saying President Barack Obama’s policies are failing.

They may be performing exactly as intended, he says.

West, a Republican, said he recently reread the Cloward-Piven strategy, proposed by two sociologists and political activists in 1966. The purpose of the strategy, offered to Democrats at the time, was to overload the welfare system so that people could be given “a guaranteed annual income and thus an end to poverty.”

Obama’s economic policies may be intended to do something similar, West hinted during a Wednesday appearance on Fox News Channel’s “On the Record with Greta Van Susteren.”

“We’re seeing an incredible growth of the welfare nanny state; we’re seeing the poverty rolls explode; we’re seeing the food stamp rolls explode; we’re seeing more dependency on government largesse and programs,” he said. “We’re seeing a desperation and a despondency out there that’s being created by this administration.”

Other Republicans have said Obama’s Affordable Care Act is intended not to work properly, but rather to fail so a single-payer, government-run system can be installed.

West, a retired lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army, also called the relaxation of military rules to allow turbans, tattoos, and piercings for religious reasons “a horrible idea.”

West said the rules are part of a social re-engineering of the military, and will eventually affect troop readiness.

He pointed to recent complaints about a Nativity scene in a Guantanamo Bay dining area and the removal of “under God” in the honor code oath at the U.S. Air Force Academy, saying that to allow haircuts and turbans for religious exercise is hypocritical.
But, he added, he should “have seen it coming when Nidal Hasan was allowed to keep his beard during trial.”

Hasan was the Army psychiatrist who killed 13 people and injured more than 30 others in the Fort Hood, Texas, mass shooting in 2009.

Mitt Romney Finally Admits What We All Knew: They “Had to Steal the Republican Nomination” from Ron Paul

A new documentary about the life of Mitt Romney reveals a loosely hidden truth: Romney and his followers “had to steal” the Republican nomination from Dr. Ron Paul during the 2012 Presidential Elections.

The documentary, called “Mitt“, was aired at the Sundance Film Festival. Near the end, Romney states:

“In some ways we kind of had to steal the Republican nomination. Our party is Southern, evangelical, and populist. And you’re Northern, and you’re a Mormon, and you’re rich. And these do not match well with our party.”

Tell us something we didn’t know.

Dr. Paul, a true Patriot, was a threat to the establishment. Can you imagine what would have happened if he’d been elected and immediately audited the Federal Reserve? The Fed’s dirty little secret would have been revealed, and it would have been shut down, causing all sorts of hullabaloo in Crony-land.

Many people criticize those who refuse to vote, saying that their abstinence is part of the problem. But when the elections are completely rigged, and your vote doesn’t matter, why would you participate in such a sham? Voting under these circumstances implies consent to be governed.

As the old saying goes, “If voting actually changed anything, they’d make it illegal.”

I am excited to find this:
Published on Jan 17, 2014
Abby Martin Breaks the Set on Killing Snowden, American Addicts, Obama’s NSA Faux Reform, and the US Funding the Taliban.
EPISODE BREAKDOWN: On this episode of Breaking the Set, Abby Martin remarks on comments made by anonymous Pentagon and NSA officials expressing their desire to see Edward Snowden dead. Abby then calls attention to the epidemic of prescription drug addiction in the US, speaking with filmmakers Sasha Knezev and Dr. Gregory Smith about their documentary ‘American Addict’ exploring the roots and effects of America’s deadly addiction to prescription narcotics. Abby then calls out Obama’s long awaited speech regarding NSA surveillance, dissecting aspects of the speech that suggest no real change to global surveillance policies. BTS wraps up the show with an interview with Douglas Wissing, journalist and author of ‘Funding the Enemy’ discussing the deteriorating relationship between Washington and Kabul, and the US governments mismanagement of taxpayer dollars that has led to both direct and indirect funding of the Taliban in Afghanistan.
You can access this and more using youtube slash BreakingTheSet.

It is associated with RT – Russia Today. There are twitter and fb presences too.
I’d been ruminating to verify what 6ABC aired today – that Edward Snowden would be live online to answer questions on a “freeSnowden” dot ? and I had to give up that endeavor.
Nevertheless, I’m quite happy about this.

Another from RT:
Whistleblower Snowden’s background security firm hit with fraud charges. 1/23/14.
…The USIS, which employs some 6,000 workers, handles roughly 45 percent of the government’s security checks on potential new hires. It is responsible for some 2.2 million background checks, including that of former NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden….http://rt.com/usa/snowden-us-security-fraud-nsa-075/

This may be how Ted Cruz goes down.
Texas executes Mexican national despite diplomatic protests
…Despite orders by President George W. Bush to review the convictions, Texas argued it was not bound by the treaty. The state’s solicitor general at the time – and now Republican senator – Ted Cruz successfully argued to the Supreme Court that states were not required to carry out the rulings of the ICJ….http://rt.com/usa/texas-execute-mexican-national-tamayo-042/

This probably is why govt is enraged by Snowden. Authored by Kim Dotcom. I had to look him up and haven’t decided if hes a good guy or bad, but he’s definitely interesting.
…Snowden’s revelations led to American corporations losing billions of dollars because of the overreach by the NSA. Commenting on that, Dotcom said that it means bad news for the US economy as a whole.
“This is a really dangerous development for the US economy, because everyone is waking up to all these American tech products being ‘backdoored’ and web-services being ‘trojanized’. And this is something that is going to lead to more and more countries, governments and large corporations moving away from services that they have to deem untrustworthy. The effect that this is going to have over the next decade on the US economy is going to be significant,” he told Max Keiser.
…“there is a huge opportunity for other countries, especially smaller countries, to not enter into the TPP (Trans-Pacific Partnership), but do their own thing and establish laws that are pro-innovation, pro-technology that protect the internet, that give operators safe harbors. So there is a huge opportunity here to cut off a massive slice of internet economy from the US government.”http://rt.com/op-edge/kim-dotcom-keiser-report-531/

This may be how Ted Cruz goes down.
Texas executes Mexican national despite diplomatic protests
…Despite orders by President George W. Bush to review the convictions, Texas argued it was not bound by the treaty. The state’s solicitor general at the time – and now Republican senator – Ted Cruz successfully argued to the Supreme Court that states were not required to carry out the rulings of the ICJ….
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Without knowing the merits of the case, I would say that on the contrary this is perfectly consistent with and will solidify his conservative credentials. States should not be required to yield to the fanciful jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice–that group of international bureaucrats sitting in the Hague who believe themselves to be a god like brooding omnipresence in the sky, as opposed to the articulate voice of a sovereign who governs with the consent of the people. Cruz’s position shows a deep and abiding respect for the doctrine of sovereignty, which like federalism, and the separation of powers and the vote, preserve the advantages of US citizenship, and our wealth relative to the rest of the world. This is part of the part that the fucking ignorant sheeple feasting on their gruel of big media tripe cannot get through their widdle heads. If you want socialism, go after the wealthy. Let us see how far their virtuous support for the third world goes, when it is financed not with other people’s money but with their own. I can tell you for sure, not more than three feet. This is the great fallacy of human nature. The wealthy are perfectly content to throw the middle class to the wolves, not realizing that the middle class are their bulwark against the teeming masses. Remove that bulkwark, and its like the old Bogie line–Sharton like creatures who rise to lead the deranged masse here’s looking at you kid. Its like Willie Sutton said when he was asked why he robbed banks: it is where the money is. And if it is not enough money to assuage the masses, at least the wealthy will find themselves in that enviable state which represents the culmination of their political logic which is total equality. The hypocrites at The Nation should contemplate that logic because it is sublime.

An independent executive branch board has concluded that the National Security Agency’s long-running program to collect billions of Americans’ phone records is illegal and should end.
In a strongly worded report to be issued Thursday, the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PCLOB) said that the statute upon which the program was based, Section 215 of the USA Patriot Act, “does not provide an adequate basis to support this program.”

I’ve actually tried to listen to Hannity radio show b/c I’m often in the car at the time of its broadcast. I never make it past the banter between him and two other people (don’t know their names). Hannity asks leading questions to inspire discussion about himself. The two co-banterers gush about him, enlightening the public about specific Hannity quirks and their unique, fascinating experiences with him. It’s a real waste of time for anyone not seeking to learn insider tidbits about Hannity. I definitely am not.
____________

Is it possible that the wealthy could harbor a detached and disinterested generosity toward the world, and can we take their tax deductible charitable contributions to that effect seriously? No. Whatever they do is laced with self interest, and often that self interest is based on a scheme of self enrichment. Well what about Mr. Magoo–that stock picker extraordinaire, who is a fixture at WashPo and left wing democrat functions. You may think him to be a superior human being until you examine how he operates as an entrepreneur. Unbeknownst to many, he owns a number of dams out west. If you happen to have a technology which could help alleviate the rift between environmentalists on the one hand and hydroelectric power companies and their customers on the other, then stay the fuck away from him, because word has it that he will steal the technology and if you sue him he will bury you with legal costs. The last true altruist died on the cross two thousand years ago. I do not resent the wealthy if they want to advance their own interests with their own money. What I resent is their dabbling in left wing politics as a way to bury the rest of us, thinking that in the end, they will not get buried as well. I see where Gates is now claiming that there will be no poverty by 2035. Is he prepared to finance that vision out of his own pocket without deductions? History has an ugly habit of repeating itself, because human nature does not change. Thus, it is hardly surprising that we should see in the current attempt by uber capitalists to control the political process, and bend it to their own perverse ends, a distant mirror of the presidential election of 1896.

foxyladi14, Sreenivasan has a weekend NewsHour which begins at 6 PM & ends at 6:30 PM lol. Other than that, he’s pretty sharp. I’m hoping that he will be a new face at PBS, one that moves the organization somewhat toward center. Cannot expect miracles.

I’ve seen just two of these newscasts. The topics he chose to cover were pleasantly surprisng. The only one I remember went into depth regarding the impressive lengths Germany is going to educate Germans about Hitler. Almost makes me think it is a guard against what we face spreading.

You have to ask yourself why would PBS do this? Maybe its the reduction of govt funding to these ardent left wingers forcing them to rely more on people for funding. It is too soon for conclusions, but worth a look. Of the two PBS stations I receive, only the NY one, the dastardly WNET, is airing Hari on the weekend. He probably does assignments during the week.

Yesterday’s date. Sorry if I’m repeating what is already here.
Administration fears part of health care system so flawed it could bankrupt insurance companies
1/22/14
Snip “Week after week, month after month,” says John Goodman of the National Center for Policy Analysis, “the Obama administration kept telling us everything’s working fine, there’s no problem and then they turn on a dime and fire their contractor.”
To justify a no-bid contract with Accenture after firing CGI as the lead contractor, the administration released documents from the Department of Health and Human Services and the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services that offered a rare glimpse of its worst fears, saying the problems with the website puts “the entire health insurance industry at risk” … “potentially leading to their default and disrupting continued services and coverage to consumers.”
Then it went even further, saying if the problems were not fixed by mid-March, “they will result in financial harm to the government.”
It even added that without the fixes “the entire health care reform program is jeopardized.”
In spite of the “urgent” need officials cited to keep the system from collapsing, the White House spokesman said he knew nothing about it.
“I didn’t see the article I’m not aware of those statements,” Jay Carney said.sniphttp://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/01/22/administration-fears-part-health-care-system-so-flawed-it-could-bankrupt/

Big media hates cable news. The Browkaw clip in the link below proves it. The question is why. Krauthammer provides an excellent diagnosis of the problem, as he always does. And miracle of miracles, even O’Reilly deviates from his usual Tin Pan Alley bluster about being on the side of the folks and provides further insight. As they say, in times past, big media spoke with one voice, and they could control the national agenda. FOX news offers a different perspective on the news, which half the country tends to agree with generally. Cable news provides a superior product to big media in terms of content, and is willing to go into the weeds to find stories, which mainstream media is not. FOX news is interactive between moderators like Megan Kelly, Bret Baird, etc. whereas Williams, Sawyer and Pelly are one dimensional news readers. FOX News reports is not constrained by the gatekeepers of big media, hence they are first to break major stories like the failure of Obamacare, which big media tried to censor until it reached critical mass. They end their analysis with a question which they cannot answer, but which I will answer with precision and clarity. They wonder why in a democracy, Brokaw would not celebrate the emergence of a competing perspective on the news, which half the country, especially outside Washington can relate to better than the minuette we see from big media. In short, why does he detest pluralism, which is the essence of democracy. You can ask me or you can ask an honest man fo the left like Hedges. Or you can ask Gramsci, the Italian communist. Big media is not the legitimate voice of the people. It is the agenda driven voice of the elite class, intent on preserving their power at the expense of the county. Will the sheeple ever figure this out. Well, as John Wayne used to say: not likely. Nonetheless, it is the truth. It is why the people must ween themselves off big media. Or else, FOX must get off cable and go on free television. Either way, they need the truth and they will never get the truth from big media. Ever/

big media has lost its monopoly, and its former ability to control the agenda.

I think FOX is smart enough to realize that they must have Hillary supporters as well as Hannity on their channel. Fortunately, they have two of the best right now–Shoen and Caddell. I hope they get Carvelle too. No, I withdraw the comment. I hope he is too involved with her campaign to be wasting his talents on commentary. Those who can do. Those who can’t become big media moderators.

In sum, I think we have to be hard line of the issue of sovereignty. There are too many temptations for the elite class to give it away, because it will not affect them, or it will inure to their financial benefit. Or, if we are going to give it away freely, then the entire subject of private property in this nation needs to be revisited as well, because one of the attributes of private property is to use it for your own enjoyment and to repel trespassers. If we are going to change the rules on sovereignty, then I want to reserve the master bedroom of the Kennedy compound for my own enjoyment, and anyone else is welcome to use it as well. The logic gets circular pretty fast. But this is the problem wie are courting with this amnesty business.

a little karma for de blasio
…The city’s treatment of the Upper East Side is the reverse of the outer-borough neglect then-Public Advocate de Blasio claimed in a letter to then-Mayor Mike Bloomberg about the 2010 Christmas blizzard.
De Blasio wrote it was “evident that the outer boroughs have been disproportionately affected by the lack of plowing.”
On Wednesday, many streets in Brooklyn were cleared down to the pavement, while major Manhattan roads remained slick and slushy. Pedestrians tumbled to the ground near the UN in front of Dag Hammarskjold Plaza.
Pedro Aponte, 48, was sweeping and salting a sidewalk nearby when he saw a man crack his head in the middle of the street.
“He slipped once, but he didn’t fall. He held his balance. Then he kept walking, and lost his balance again and he couldn’t stay up that time,” Aponte said. “His head bounced and hit twice.”
At the corner of West 55th Street and Seventh Avenue, a tractor-trailer got stuck at midday, its wheels spinning as the driver tried to get some traction.
The big rig blocked all traffic on West 55th Street and a lane on Seventh Avenue for about 10 minutes before the driver finally rocked it free.
At the corner of Seventh Avenue and West 43rd Street, a helpless cabby needed passers-by to push his taxi free after it got stuck in the snow.
“This is madness. This is bad, bad. Why is it not cleared?” he muttered.
In Times Square, software engineer Richard Yu, 27 — walking with a cane to a physical -therapy appointment — was bewildered as he tried to figure out how to navigate Broadway and West 42nd Street….http://nypost.com/2014/01/22/de-blasio-admits-botched-upper-east-side-plow-job/

So, first Cuomo tells us who should be allowed – and not allowed – to live in the state and now Warren Wilhelm has come out to back him up. Oh – Warren calls himself de Blasio now, in case you didn’t recognize the name.

Intolerance runs deep among the left At least among these two men.
=======

De Blasio Backs Cuomo’s Remarks That Conservatives “Have No Place” In New York: “I Stand By That 100 Percent”…

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio emphatically backed New Governor Andrew Cuomo’s controversial remarks that “extreme” conservatives – which he defined as being pro-life, second amendment advocates, or supporters of traditional marriage – “have no place in the state of New York.”

“I stand by that 100 percent,” de Blasio told reporters at the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Washington, D.C. on Thursday.

“I agree with Governor Cuomo’s remarks. I interpret his remarks to say that an extremist attitude that continues the reality of violence in our communities or an extremist attitude that denies the rights of women does not represent the views of New York State,” he added.

Governor Cuomo riled up conservatives in New York state as well as all over the country when he told a local New York State radio program last Friday “extreme conservatives who are right-to-life, pro-assault-weapon, anti-gay….have no place in the state of New York, because that’s not who New Yorkers are.”

Yesterday we learned of the Obama administration’s allowance for beards and turbans to be allowed by soldiers serving in the U.S. Military. Some are already stating this was in deference to Sikhs serving, but there are currently only THREE active duty Sikhs in our military, and nearly FOUR THOUSAND
known Muslims. Combine this with Muslim terrorist killer Nidal Malik Hasan, who shot and killed 13 and injured 30 at Fort Hood while serving as an Army Major, and his recent demand to be able to grow a beard while in military prison. And at nearly the same time as this was happening, the Obama administration quietly ordered the banning of the centuries old Navy Jack flag on military uniforms, citing the flag as being associated with “radical groups”. Apparently, Barack Obama and his legion of progressive leftists, feel the history of our Navy and Navy SEALS, is just far too “radical.”

Administration fears part of health care system so flawed it could bankrupt insurance companies

—-
They just realized their golden gift to the insurance companies is nothing more than a Trojan Horse?

All those kids that worked for ACORN, those that followed the Kooks lead, and bullied others to vote for the ‘younger’ half black guy that was so ‘smart about everything’ are no longer donating and answering their spam messages to buy ObamaCare.

They will continue to be in denial until the uninsured line up on the streets to get into the emergency rooms.

I hope they get Carvelle too. No, I withdraw the comment. I hope he is too involved with her campaign to be wasting his talents on commentary. Those who can do. Those who can’t become big media moderators.

So, first Cuomo tells us who should be allowed – and not allowed – to live in the state and now Warren Wilhelm has come out to back him up. Oh – Warren calls himself de Blasio now, in case you didn’t recognize the name.

Intolerance runs deep among the left At least among these two men.
=======

De Blasio Backs Cuomo’s Remarks That Conservatives “Have No Place” In New York: “I Stand By That 100 Percent”…

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio emphatically backed New Governor Andrew Cuomo’s controversial remarks that “extreme” conservatives – which he defined as being pro-life, second amendment advocates, or supporters of traditional marriage – “have no place in the state of New York.”

“I stand by that 100 percent,” de Blasio told reporters at the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Washington, D.C. on Thursday.

“I agree with Governor Cuomo’s remarks. I interpret his remarks to say that an extremist attitude that continues the reality of violence in our communities or an extremist attitude that denies the rights of women does not represent the views of New York State,” he added.

Governor Cuomo riled up conservatives in New York state as well as all over the country when he told a local New York State radio program last Friday “extreme conservatives who are right-to-life, pro-assault-weapon, anti-gay….have no place in the state of New York, because that’s not who New Yorkers are.”

As much as I disagree with some of the conservative beliefs, as well as some views of the radical left, I fully respect their rights as AMERICANS to believe as they choose. The fanatic extremists on both sides of the political spectrum are contributing to the erosion of the rights and freedoms of Americans, especially the right of free speech.

Both groups have always had a presence in this country. But, in recent years, aided by the radical left and far right media, bloggers, etc., both sides have distorted the truth and confused the issues to such an extent that average Americans, moderates on both sides are finding it harder to figure out where they belong in terms of American politics and government.

There must be some respect for basic constitutional rights and for human rights and decency – regardless of one’s political beliefs. I hope both Cuomo and DeBlasio come to regret their intolerance.

WTH is Chuckie smoking? Charles (the two-faced backstabber) Schumer thinks that Dems can win over middle class Tea Party members.

______________

January 23, 2014, 02:50 pm
”
“Schumer: Dems can win over Tea Party

By Alexander Bolton

(snip)
Schumer laid out his vision for political success in a major speech Thursday addressing the Center for American Progress Action Fund, a pro-Democratic advocacy group, intended to energize fellow Democrats who have been on the defensive since the botched rollout of ObamaCare last year.
He lamented that Democrats have become “quiet, defensive and even ashamed” of their pro-government views.

Warning: We’re about to run down the biggest TV moments from Wednesday night. If you don’t want to be spoiled on a particular show, skip to the next!
American Horror Stroy: Coven: WHERE. TO. START!? First, we’ll let you catch your breath because the latest episode of American Horror Story: Coven was insane. So much happened! Let’s break it down…
Madame Delphine LaLaurie vs. Marie Laveau: Inspired by Marie’s own idea, LaLaurie hacked up the voodoo witch and distributed her around New Orleans. We didn’t get to see Angela Bassett’s body-less head, but we did get a gruesome scene of the hack job. After that was done, LaLaurie returned to her home, got a makeover (she ditched that wig and the awful clothes Queenie gave her in favor of some pearls and a blazer) and started rewriting history and giving her own tours of her house. It was there Queenie found her and killed her. Yep, stabbed her right in the heart. Queenie convinced the voodoo king that Marie could no longer keep up her end of the bargain (an innocent soul a year) because she was in pieces, so her deal was void, leaving her to die and LaLaurie mortal. The two bitter enemies ended up in hell together, with Marie torturing LaLaurie and her family for all eternity.
Fiona vs. the Coven: Cordelia really did a number on her eyes, but her second sight didn’t immediately return. Emphasis on immediately. When it did come back to her, it was a bit different: she could see the future. Cordelia saw her mother slaughter the coven – her included – and take off alone, the reigning supreme once again. She informed the Axeman of her mother’s plans to betray him, found Misty Day in the tomb, and rescued her with the help of Queenie, who ripped apart the tomb and brought Misty back to life. Hmmm, Queenie seems to be getting mighty powerful. Misty wasn’t very pleased with Madison – naturally – and beat the crap out of her while everybody watched. The Axeman wasn’t pleased with Fiona’s plans and STABBED HER IN THE BACK. How about that betrayal reversal! After he dumped her in the swamp, he then made his way to the coven and tried to kill the witches. Boy did he come into the wrong house. The ladies – all very powerful at this point – showed him what happens when you come play in their house and stabbed him to death, for the second time in history! With Fiona dead (!?) the remaining young witches (including Zoe who returned from Florida with the power to bring people back from the dead) will be tested with the Seven Wonders. The next supreme will be revealed next week. Who do you think it is? Tell us in the comments below!

“I’m wondering how this is going to work out, because he’s in a wheelchair and most of the slogans are ‘Stand With Wendy,’” a Davis supporter who is associated with Battleground Texas, an activist group comprised mostly of leftover Obama campaign volunteers, can be heard saying in a highly-edited video released by Project Veritas.

“What I think is interesting is he’s in a wheelchair but he has no sympathy for anyone or any way. He may have a personality disorder,” another volunteer added.

The video also captures questionable comments made by pro-Davis volunteers during an Austin Democratic group meeting.

“He doesn’t speak well, he isn’t good looking, he doesn’t have a good personality, and he’s in a wheelchair [emphasis added],” a Davis supporter said at the meeting.

Soon after the video was released Thursday, Bo Delp, Davis’ communications director, attacked Project Veritas founder James O’Keefe for smearing the Democratic state senator with one of his “trademark deceptive videos.”

“O’Keefe is trying to create the impression that Wendy Davis attended this meeting and condones the language in this video,” Phillips said.

Davis, however, lost no time distancing herself from the video and condemned the remarks as “abhorrent.”

“Greg Abbott has persevered through great personal challenge to raise a family, have a productive career, and for that he deserves our respect,” she said in a prepared statement.

Now, it’s important to note that the above video presents only a quick glimpse into what was said about Abbott. That is, we aren’t getting the full context of those conversations.

“This is a conversation that anyone strategizing to elect Davis was going to have, just as the Abbott campaign was going to strategize (hopefully without cameras in the room) about how to run against a woman without making gaffes,” Slate’s Dave Weigel suggests. “’Stand With [name of candidate]’ is a common frame, used by Marco Rubio — only natural, isn’t it, to wonder if it looks cruel when the opponent can’t walk?”

This is certainly a point worth considering.

Maybe the remarks captured on tape were cruel jokes made at Abbott’s expense. Maybe they weren’t. In any case, Davis’ campaign is already in trouble thanks to recent revelations about her real past — and this Project Veritas video isn’t going to do her any favors.

Born into slavery as one of the youngest of thirteen children of James and Elizabeth in Ulster County, New York, in 1797, Sojourner Truth’s given name was Isabella Baumfree. As almost all of her brothers and sisters had been sold to other slave owners, some of her earliest memories were of her parents’ stories of the cruel loss of their other children. [snip]

In 1843, she changed her name to Sojourner Truth – her name for a traveling preacher, one who speaks the truth – and left New York. She traveled throughout New England, where she met and worked with abolitionists such as William Lloyd Garrison, and Frederick Douglass. Her life story, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth: A Northern Slave, written with the help of friend Olive Gilbert, was published in 1850.

While traveling and speaking in states across the country, Sojourner Truth met many women abolitionists and noticed that although women could be part of the leadership in the abolitionist movement, they could neither vote nor hold public office. It was this realization that led Sojourner to become an outspoken supporter of women’s rights.

In 1851, she addressed the Women’s Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio, delivering her famous speech “Ain’t I a Woman?” The applause she received that day has been described as “deafening.” From that time on, she became known as a leading advocate for the rights of women. She became one of the nineteenth century’s most eloquent voices for the cause of anti-slavery and women’s rights.

January 28, 2009

NoLimits.org will "keep you up to date with news about issues on which Hillary took a lead and we know you care so much about," group President Ann Lewis said in an e-mail to as many as 2 million people culled from the Clinton campaign database.

Because No Limits is a registered nonprofit, "it cannot do anything political. It has to be nonpartisan," said Lewis, a longtime senior adviser to Clinton.

In Clinton's job as secretary of state for President Obama, her political dealings are highly restricted.

For example, she shut down her political action committee.

Some, like Democratic consultant and former Bill Clinton aide Chris Lehane, dismiss talk that the group could be a springboard for Clinton to try again for the White House in, say, 2016.

"Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar," Lehane said. "I think this is just [a] group of folks who developed relationships in an intense [electoral] environment and want to stay together."

But the University of Virginia's Larry Sabato countered: "Whenever a group like this says it's not a political organization, you just know it is."

"Maybe [this] is Hillary's answer to Obama's new 'change' group that controls his golden mailing list. Maybe it's a way for Secretary of State Clinton to mobilize backing for her objectives at the State Department," he said. "And maybe [it's] a standby committee of supporters in case Hillary decides to get back into elective politics."

Democratic consultant Hank Sheinkopf said NoLimits.org is "one way to make sure that she - and/or the former President - still have political leverage."

Hillary World-Wide January 26, 2009

Secretary of State Hillary R. Clinton Meets Afghan Women Lawyers. Secretary of State Hillary R. Clinton met today at the State Department with fourteen prominent Afghan women judges, prosecutors, and defense attorneys. These jurists were in Washington to participate in a training program arranged by the Department’s Public-Private Partnership for Justice Reform in Afghanistan. Secretary Clinton told them: "Your American friends greatly admire your bravery and courage. It is your work in the tough environment of Afghanistan for women lawyers that will bring real reform and the rule of law to the Afghan people. As President Obama made clear yesterday in his first foreign policy announcement, we are committed to supporting your efforts to bring security and stability to your country."